A downloadable game for Windows

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  • "The writing and characters are what stands out here. Despite the game's short length, they're well-written and easy to care for, and the game's emotional moments hit excellently." - Jum, Steam
  • "Retrace is an ambitious first attempt, and gets a lot right." - UpperCut Crit
  • "Retrace is the mashup of Nier Automata, Zero Escape and horror you wanted" - PlayDiaries

A WORLD THAT DESIRES YOUR DEATH

You and your friends find yourself in a strange, unforgiving place. Frantically you seek a way out, but death lurks at every corner, and when it finds you, that’s when your resolve is rewarded with the ability to rewind time. What path will lead you out? What decisions will you have to make? And what secrets will you uncover in the dark?

A RICH TRADITION

Explore a beautifully atmospheric 2D world with a mix of pixel art and painted portraits. Within it you’ll find a mixture of traditional logic puzzles and heart-pounding action sequences, as well as secrets and mysteries.

DEATH IS YOUR TEACHER

This world desires your death, but that does not mean the end. Use what you learn on one path to explore further down another. Find shortcuts, piece together clues and study patterns that will lead you to victory.

USE YOUR HEAD OR LOSE IT

Freya is faced with locked door after locked door in her quest to escape, and the only way to unlock them is to play her captor's game--solving the logic puzzles contained within each room. The consequences for getting them wrong can be ... unpleasant.

QUEER ROMANCE IN DANGEROUS PLACES


Complicating matters is Freya's long-standing crush on her best friend, Mia. Will the terror of their experience bring them closer together, or tear them apart? And what of Claire, the prisoner who admires Freya as her saviour? Freya's choices will influence more than just her survival, but also her relationships.

✿💀✿

ABOUT THE TEAM
Retrace is developed by Spider Lily Studios lead developer Els White, with programming assistance by Julian Adams, art by Domi Cesarz and music by harmonicblend.

✿💀✿

Purchase the OST and Art Book for Retrace here!

Looking for more games by the studio? Check out the rest of the Retrace Series and Schrodinger's Catgirl, currently in development!

Updated 13 days ago
StatusReleased
PlatformsWindows
Rating
Rated 4.7 out of 5 stars
(103 total ratings)
AuthorSpider Lily Studios
GenreAdventure, Puzzle
Made withGameMaker
TagsAtmospheric, Female Protagonist, Horror, Lesbian, LGBT, Mystery, Psychological Horror, Retro, Transgender
Average sessionA few hours
LanguagesEnglish, Chinese (Simplified)
InputsKeyboard, Mouse
LinksSteam, Steam, Soundtrack, Artbook

Purchase

Buy Now$7.99 USD or more

In order to download this game you must purchase it at or above the minimum price of $7.99 USD. You will get access to the following files:

retrace-win.zip 129 MB
Version 6

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Support this game at or above a special price point to receive something exclusive.

Game+OST

Purchase this and get a copy of the OST at a discount!

4 extra keys!

Save $10 when you buy a set of 5 keys! Got friends who'd like the game? Why not gift them a copy?

Purchasing this pack will give you a total of  five itch or Steam download keys; simply include the number of each you'd prefer (for example, 2 itch, 3 Steam). If the total number you enter is above 5, itch keys will take priority.

Download demo

Download
retrace_demo.zip 128 MB

Development log

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Comments

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Absolutely amazing game. I love the retrace mechanic. I love the characters and the story and the puzzles and the art and honestly everything. I had so much fun getting all the endings. Definitely a game I will recommend to friends <3

i played this game a couple of years ago and i still think about it. one of the few games I wish I could enjoy again for the first time.  excellent gameplay and intriguing story.

Is there a guide for this? I'm having trouble finding "joy" in the first puzzle

There is! You can find it here on Steam.

I started this game a couple days ago, and for the next several hours, I was completely glued to my screen. It's rare I sit down and play a game for that long all at once these days, but I could not stop playing Retrace. Having to learn from past mistakes and deaths to progress is such a fantastic concept for a game. And here, it's executed so well. 

I found the characters compelling enough that I genuinely cared about them and wanted to see them survive. The story was interesting and always made me want to see what would happen next. I loved the game's art style and character sprites. Even the soundtrack was great; I enjoyed each track and never found myself growing tired of one. And "Falling Snow" is such a beautiful, lovely theme song. 

I wanted to see all that I possibly could in this game, and for the most part, I did. I believe I missed one bad end, but saw all of the other endings and many of the different variations. After spending that time with Retrace, I can safely say I absolutely loved it. This is a great game and I'll definitely be recommending it to other people. I'm also very excited to see what you make in the future! 

I can see why so many people have recommended this game, as it's very interesting and ambitious, but I'm having a lot of trouble with the flags and save states. I'm very regularly picking up items I've already picked up after I've used them, I can't seem to properly trigger new events or clear progress when switching to new books, and a lot of weird triggers keep coming up like getting dialogue for being alone in Mia's book after going back down with Mia.

(+1)

Ah, yeah, "ambitious" is definitely the word when it comes to the flags. It's odd that you're getting that level of repetition though - I suspect something's gone wrong that's caused a knock-on effect.

If you like, you can email contact@spiderlilystudios.com with the "retrace.save" file you'll find in your install directory (usually C:/Users/[your name]/AppData/retrace) and I can attempt to repair the save file for you, otherwise, judicious use of "New Game" and the fast forward function may be in order. I'm really sorry about this! It's been a year and a half since release and I'm still finding new ways the variables can interact to break everything. Even so, I'm glad you're finding it interesting!

I really enjoyed it! Quick question, what are the achievements in the bottom row? One for all the special deaths, but what about the others? I could have sworn I had the first one at some point, but my latest save shows none of the final row lit up.

Incidentally, if I've beaten the game, do I lose progress by starting from the beginning? Right now "continue" only takes me to the final area, so I can't get the named deaths anymore.

The achievements can be a little bit finicky! One is for seeing all the special bad ends, one's for "retracing to the beginning" (I believe that's the one that's most likely to break), and then the two endings.

Unfortunately, yes, starting again means losing progress. At least there's text fast-forward...? ^^;

I'm really glad you enjoyed it!

Thank you! I guess the only achievement I didn't actually get was the special deaths one then, since the other two are the White and Gold ends? Those never lit up for me, because "continue" would simply take me to that final area just before I got the ending. Not a big deal, I did get to see (just about) all the content.

I'll definitely be recommending this game to friends! :) 

Great game! Totally recommend!!

Gah! after I let it sit for so long and I'm so glad I finally picked this up! 

I love the big and small things about this game; like how every item has it's own quirky little description (even they change too depending on what route you're on ie: sunflowers) I'm a really big fan of the ENDs system -- having access to information from another timeline might just save a life or two.

I read some threads on the teams twitter and oh boy was I swept of my feet ; The scrapped princess chair puzzle was really clever! But I think the one in the game works wayyy better in the end. There were other great ideas that didn't get into the game, but I hope they show up in any future puzzle games you write!

I really love the characters they all have their own problems that I'm sooo eager to explore; it's like it's own mystery in itself! In another comment you said there may be some future projects with them -- safe to say I'll be sticking around <3

;A; thank you so much! This really means a lot, I really appreciate you writing such a lovely comment. I'll be sure to make something amazing for you in the future...!

This is quite ambitious! There were definitely moments where I couldn't figure out what to do, or tell whether something was meant to have happened or not, but I was engaged throughout and I bet this was a really interesting project to put together.

(+1)

Haha, thank you! I definitely learned a lot, and there's a lot I would do differently with the benefit of hindsight, but I'm glad you enjoyed it anyway!

Heyy!! Um, so theres something where I don't know what to do. I have three gems lit on the blue pedestal, two on the red, yellow and green one and three windows (the one where Claire has a hand on Freyas arm and you see Freyas Side profile, the one with Owen crying and the one where Lucas and Freya are holding onto each other). I was in the main room with Owen after I solved the Wolf puzzle but every door was locked and I couldn't go anywhere. I legitimately don't know how to trigger other endings, is there something im missing? 

Hey! I'm sorry this has happened! Could you do me a favour and email contact@spiderlilystudios.com with your save file? Owen's room locking has happened once before so I'd like to hunt it down... And it seems like you have more endings than the game thinks you do, which has happened to a few other people. I think I'm close to solving it, so you'd really be doing me a favour ^^; It's in C:/Users/[yourname]/AppData/Local/retrace. Just grab those files and send them my way and I'll get it fixed up for you! So sorry!

I sadly can't find app data ^^'  when i search it in my user on C drive and open local it just says office but that's probably just me being stupid

Ah, it might be hidden, some computers do that - try right clicking and see if you can find a "Show hidden files" option. I should have remembered that can happen, sorry for not mentioning it!

Claire ending gem doesn’t light up for me, I can’t use the center pillar to finish the game. :( also the “achieved” page only has Mia’s ending as achieved. Don’t know if that’s related.

(+1)

Hm, that's very strange indeed. Could you send your save to contact@spiderlilystudios.com? Hopefully I can find went wrong, and if not I should at least be able to repair it for you!

Save sent! Also included some additional details.

Hi there! I started playing your game and I love it! I'm a bit stuck on how to get the Miowen and Claire end, though could you possibly help with that? When I try to follow the guide for Claires thats on steam I found it gives me the hopeless end, and with miowen using the same guide I can't find the key. Sorry for the inconvenience in me asking this! 

(WARNING: SPOILERS)


Not at all! Uh, okay, let's see...For both of them you'll probably need to start Mia's path from the very beginning (from the bus stop) and leave the note in the cell. (If you've got the right note, Freya will mention a trap, but if you already have Lucas' end you should be fine. If not, try to remember any other place you've seen that symbol.) From there follow the usual Hopeless end steps and you should get Claire's end. 

As for Miowen, which key were you missing?

Thank you so much!! I just checked and saw Freya mention the trap when I sent the note tysm! The key i'm missing for Miowen is the one on the table in the library, the guide I followed said there should be a key there but I didn't see any. I'm guessing i'll have to start over from the bus stop to have it spawn maybe? Thank you again for the help <3

(2 edits)

I've already played this game a lot of time and i just want to tell you how amazing this games.

I wanna more of this character and i want to see them more in your future project.

thank you for making this game especially the LGBTQ+ queer character, bc i love it so much.

i kinda want to buy this on Steam now since i want to play the game more and the ost too.  TvT

btw thanks for posting this game on itch since it's better rather than Steam for me lol.

I'm so glad to hear this. Thank you for taking the time to comment.

It might take a little while, but I have some ideas for future games with these characters, so please look forward to it 💜

you're welcome :3 and i can't wait for your future project especially since i've fallen in love with Retrace characters so much ^^ so thank you for replying to me and good luck.


now i really want to buy it on steam so that i can play the game again since i miss them so much. 

This is some seriously impressive work. Holy crap. Love love love the queer representation, puzzles are well put together, all the characters are great, and the art is fantastic. Very very nice work.

This was easily one of the best short games I've played in a long time. I opened it up to see what kind of game it was to categorize it, and I was immediately caught up in the story. This has to be one of my favorite story genres, too.


Though! Having finished it, I have so many questions about the story. One really big one, that I don't want to spoil for anyone.

The game is interesting to play, but I think I have gotten a bug somewhere in the middle of it, considering that I got chapel scene out of nowhere (didn't know  what it was cause that was my first time seeing it).

Now I cannot get Mia&Owen end, Lucas is alive, and I always get "unprepared".

Pity, I wanted to play until the end too =(

Ah, I'm so sorry!

If you look in your computer files C:/Users/[name]/AppData/Local/Retrace, you should find a file called retrace.save. If you email it to contact@spiderlilystudios.com, I should hopefully be able to repair the file for you. If you could include any information on what you already saw when the bug happened that would be really helpful as well.

I loved it so much. The dread and uneasiness at the start, the confusion as I figured out the world, and the feelings I developed towards the characters were all fantastic. During my first route I found a character I didn't trust, and I would have liked to see a route where you could leave that character behind. Also, near the end, there's a puzzle with an instant fail condition that can get a bit annoying to keep retrying. Other than that, it was a fantastic experience!

This is such a lovely game! It's not long, but there's a surprising amount of content--I won't spoil anything, but I definitely didn't expect there to be an entire other chunk of game after a particular point!

I enjoyed the characterization in particular. The characters were fairly lightly sketched (not really enough time to get deep into characters, after all) but done well enough that they felt distinct and like there was a lot more under the surface. The puzzles were also fun. Not too difficult, yet satisfying. The chapel puzzle was particularly good (especially figuring out the logistics of whether or not it was solvable depending on who I had available!)

I finally, finally finished this game!  

This was so much fun to play! It was frustrating, but in a good way, trying to figure out how to get all of the endings. Just when I thought I'd have it figured out, it was something else! I even rage quit after being Unprepared a couple of times, couldn't figure out what I could possibly do differently to solve the game...  
  
It stayed on my mind until I came back a few days later, got the rest of the endings first try and COMPLETED IT! You KNOW you've made a good game when people HAVE to finish it to see what happens!  

The art was beautiful, the game and puzzles were the perfect difficulty - where they're simple enough to understand but need to be figured out properly. The music was really good, the dialogue was really well written, as were the characters. 

You've made an exceptional game here and it was very fun to play! <3 

;u; thank you so, so, so much. I'm so glad you enjoyed it.

So far I've really been enjoying the game! Unfortunately I think I may have run into a glitch...? Major spoilers ahead!

So I've managed to stumble my way through several ENDs at this point, including the three normal ones, Unprepared, Claire's,  Crying Wolf and several others whose names I can't recall. Blue pedestal has three gems lit and Red, Yellow, and Green pedestals all have two. I have four windows (Mia, Lucas, Clarie, and that one with Clarie holding onto Freya's arm) but I haven't been able to progress any further. 

For a while I thought I was just missing something in a third Lucas run because after Owen dies in the Library I found myself stuck in the Lobby and Parlor with all the doors locked or.... Closed from the other side. Sometimes Lucas will grab the Gore key but I'm not entirely sure what prompts it and even when he does all the doors remain locked. It feels like an END scenario but I can still move around and interact with things. Eventually I swallowed my pride and poked around online for a solution and found that apparently this might be the criteria for a Lumia END that isn't triggering? The guide I found lists endings in a different order than the way I completed them and now I'm stuck with Lucas and Mia and no way to continue, did I move on before I should have or something?

I honestly think I might just be missing something but the fact that NOTHING I try is budging made me wonder if something is going wrong behind the scenes.  If I'm missing something a hint would be greatly appreciated, though I hate to concede defeat like that  (-_-;)


ALSO!!! I found Retrace in the Bundle For Racial Justice and Equality and honestly it's so cool that you decided to include it there! 

It's definitely possible that there's a glitch =n=; If you look in C:/Users/[name]/AppData/Local/Retrace (or similar...Doing that off the top of my head), you should find a file called retrace.save. If you email that to contact@spiderlilystudios.com, I can check if something's gone wrong with the variables internally.

That said, if all the gems are lit up, your next step *should* be to check the middle pedestal...

I'm glad you're enjoying it, though! Thank you for playing! ^u^

Really interesting, thought-provoking game! Props for creating  well-developed, fascinating characters in a relatively short game. Loved the queer rep.

The ending leaves me wanting a little more, but in some ways that's just a mark of a good story. :)

(+1)

Hehe, thank you so much! I'd like to do some more stories with these characters sometime.

Very enjoyable game! Likable characters, really great art and soundtrack. Pretty engaging plot, and solutions never felt like they were entirely out of reach. Maybe felt a little bit rushed towards the end, but honestly didn't bother me that much and I still really enjoyed this game! Absolutely worth playing, esp if you got it from the big bundle!

Thank you so much!

Seems promising, but I encountered a softlock right at the start of the game.  I started with Owen, and left the starting room without picking up the keyring from the table.  The door jams behind you and you can't get anywhere in the next room until you restart the game and take the keys.

Huh, that definitely shouldn't be happening. Owen's supposed to grab them for you, but that event mustn't be triggering properly. Thanks for the heads up!

Loved the art and the concept of the game!  I enjoyed how small things like leaving a note can change your route and how Freya changed over time!

If I had one piece of advice for further games it would be to maybe slow down the pacing a bit. I think this game would've been even better if scenes had taken a bit more time (and more detail) especially when you do your first run (but it might also have felt weird to me since it took Owen's hand first which wasn't a good route to start in my opinion). 

Thank you for the feedback! Pacing is the thing I struggle most with as a writer, so I really appreciate you taking the time to tell me.

loving the game, but i've encountered some strange glitches...? after an owen scene with him banging on the door, i finished that END and went on to do something in mias but then i got stuck between her and a corpse in the cell so i went to the title and went back and it brought me into that scene again... except owen walked into a wall and then lucas followed him also into a wall. it's not super important (and very funny) but i thought i'd mention it!
https://imgur.com/a/vymizew

*facepalm* Oh dear. Thanks for the heads up! I'll try to get that under control.

Extremely fun game, I'm still trying to work out all the endings- there is a glitch, spoilers ahead. I was on Mias beginning route, found Owen dead and put his body in the church, then when I went back to the crypt where it started, I was able to put a note through the jail cell and "save" owen despite the fact I had seen him dead. I hadn't moved through the void and was able to reach the teq party scene. I don't think that is how it is intended to be

(+1)

Ahaha...yeah, definitely not. I'm putting a patch up today or tomorrow, so I'll squish that one. Thank you for the heads up!

 Hi! I almost cleared the game I think, but this error happends when i try to get the key in Mia's route (with her dead) after I have gotten most ends

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/474192600644059138/720360462977597560/unknown.png 


The game is SUPER COOL  

Oh, huh, that's so strange. Well, it's an easy fix, at least! It's late here, so I'll get to it first thing in the morning! Sorry for the inconvenience! And thank you, I'm so glad you're enjoying it!

Yeah don't worry, I just assumed I had to warn about it! It's also easy to keep playing the game, I just had to get the key before Mia died, and then let her die ;x; 


I finished it and I REALLY LIKED IT!! 

I'm so so glad!! ;u;

Deleted 1 year ago

this is happening to me too :(

Deleted 1 year ago

Well that's bizarre! I'll take a look. Thanks for letting me know, guys!

Right, I think it's fixed, sorry for the inconvenience! Let me know if you continue to have problems!

Deleted 1 year ago