Loved the game. I got so hooked I stayed awake until 5 am solving it! Everything fits together so beautifully and intelligently, and there are so many moments of sudden realization where things finally click which felt really great. I didn't know a word search puzzle could have plot twists lol. Figuring out the themes and words for each puzzle was especially a joy. And I genuinely laughed out loud a bunch of times! Like when I realized the gingerbread man was a clue the whole time. I felt really smart for figuring things out and at the same time really stupid for not figuring them out sooner.
The only criticism I have is that wasn't clear to me whether the leftovers from puzzle 12 were really supposed to be the intended final word. Considering the nature of the game, I think it's to be expected that players won't so easily accept being told there are no more puzzles and that they've won. I felt the game was pushing me to do something else to uncover a different word under the squiggly line, like there was a secret 'true ending' lol. I spent over an hour on that until I realized that it makes absolute sense for the 12th word and the leftovers to be the same since all the other words are the leftovers from the previous puzzles...
I don't know what could be done to change this, or if it's even worth it as I don't even know if my confusion at the end is a common enough experience or not. Having said that, maybe you could have the letters for the final word be completely covered by the line? Seeing parts of the shapes made me think I could find a different word with other letters that also fit there, like an X instead of an A or G or Q instead of an O. The blotch on n15 also threw me off since it looks like it could also be an M, an R or a Y. Also, both the letters inside the circle and the fact that there's exactly 15 letters (excluding the E that's left over) covered by it felt like they could be clues. I even tried rearranging them to see if they could form a coherent phrase. Maybe there could be individual blotches on some of the letters instead of a circle?
Anyway, thank you so much for making this and giving it out for free! Have you considered making a patreon or a ko-fi or something?