Reviews by tggdan3

The game is a short joke game. You forgot to give your game a story. However, I have a sneaking suspicion that the author was learning how to use inform7 and this is what he came up with. The one trick pony doesn't do it's trick well- very little is implemented, and the two items you have walk you through the whole thing. (never mind the walkthrough on the game's main page).

Not particularly funny, not particularly memorable, no value in replay. But maybe that's the point- he forgot to give his game a story too.

The concept is the disproval of Pascal's Wager. In a nutshell: If you believe in God and are wrong, what have you lost? So it's safer to believe in God. The rebuttal is that this assumes 1 god, if there are more than 1 god, then you can still lose.

So in this game, a random God is chosen, and you have to lead a life that would please that god.

However, this game is more about wandering around than worshipping your God. The hints are adaptive at least, but it's hard knowing what you're supposed to do (that's the point). Your family worships one god, but that might not be the right god.

There are 3 scenes you play in. I've found ways to progress in them, but never got into heaven. Mostly because I'm not familiar with each God's Dogma. (Never really studied Cuthulu, or Mammon for that matter). That being the case, I'm not sure what my goals are. When God is catholic, should you get a part time job, or join the baseball team, or finish your homework?

As far as implementation, some things could be more polished. Attempting to take chemicals form the janitor closet even goes so far as to say "That's just scenery". There's also some books you can read as a child, and others you can't. I accidentially entered my own locker, and you can't move in a compass direction without first typing >GET OUT. A simple (first leaving the locker) would have been better.

Some of the hallways are too long, and could have been combined. I did find a very horrendous scene (Spoiler - click to show) in which a child puts his baby brother in the fridge which makes me wonder which God gives this as the "supposed to" ending.

With all the randomness, each playthrough offers something new, but it makes it very hard to know if you are doing anything right, and replays are re-randomized, so it's tough even to brute force your way through it. And in order to find out what God is in charge, you have to roll a magic die, and then figure out what the symbol on it means. Yes, in life you don't know which god is in charge, and that's the point, but the game could have focused less on solving puzzles (like getting a bat for the baseball game or getting into the library) and more on simple choices. (like whether you get a job or try out for baseball, without making it into a complex puzzle). The puzzle of pleasing a given god is enough without making the way you please them a puzzle as well.

I would definately be interested in further stories along this line, or other works from the author. I just think he was trying to do too much at once here, and it got away from him.

So now I understand what the big deal was with phone booth and aisle.

This is a one-turn game. You are inserted in one moment in a man in the supermarket. You decide his next move.

The writing has a more serious tone, and it explores how small choices can have a big consequence. Each action leads to a new ending. What's cute here also is that each choice then takes you back to the beginning to try another choice, instead of that RESTORE, RESTART, UNDO option.

Most actions are accepted. I wouldn't call it a joke game, it seriously lets you choose your ONE action and gives you legitimate responses. This really inspires me to try to create a similar game, as I'm sure it has for others.

The beginning really draws you in- you are playing only part of this man's story, and with each action, you are invited to try ANOTHER story (the same story, with a new option). Definately worth a try. It's very short, but if only all IF could be this interactive, but on a bigger scale, what a wonderful genre it could be.

First I played pick up the phone booth and die. As I began to play this, I had no idea how there could possibly be so many authors. What did the original take, like 10 minutes to program?

But then I tried it. Of course, the responses to the old game's commands were here, and silly. (This game assumes you played the other). Then there are endings for just about whatever you do (or at least whatever I tried to do).

The writing is very clever (and some reminiscent of Monty Python!). What's nice is it's a game about PLAYING, and not WINNING. Just go out and see what they thought of, and what the responses are, instead of trying to get ye flask or finding the torch room, or SUVEH TIA ANI MATO... instead it's just a nice little game to play with, I'd give it my vote for IF game that most resembles a Flash Game you would find on addictinggames.com.

My only regret is that it didn't seem to understand "Dial".

Okay, it's clearly a joke game. And yes, it's a one room game with only one item in it- the phone booth.

And as the title says, if you pick up the phone booth, you will die.

The writing is very cute. I enjoy how it your score is related, whether you die or win. (Yes, there is a winning ending). Despite other reviews, it's really not all that hard to find- I found it on my second try (after picking it up, of course!)

Don't expect too much, it's a joke game. But I've played others that aren't funny. This one was. Play it for a laugh. Then move on. But don't hate on it, because it does well what it promises to do.

So, what's going on here?

If you're easily frustrated by games with missing synonyms and verbs that should have been, this will frustrate you.

Even in the first room we have a nightstand (which cannot be opened and cannot be referred to as "stand"). In the next room we have a television which cannot be referred to as "TV". We have a stove that can't be opened. "Its an electric stove. You have no clue how to use it. It is being used at the moment." How do I know it's being used if I have no clue how to use it? If it can't be opened, what's cooking ON it?

My wife is there. I can't kiss her. She's making breakfast "The young woman engrossed in making breakfast". But she doesn't respond to breakfast, I can't ask her about it.

The next room contains an elevator, I think. There's a button. Pushing it causes machine sounds, like an elevator. I waited. and waited. Then I said, enough of this.

This seems to be a remake of another game. I took it upon myself to play the other game. Now I get it. In the original, it's a graphic game that responds to clicks only (and limited ones at that), and has your character running left across the screen.

The game it's a port of has limited interaction, and this is a "faithful recreation". As such, there's very little to do here. I got further in the graphical game.

I question the value of the port, given that the old one was flash and easily playable online. More of the problem was that IF generally implies more interactivity than simple clicking, and this port doesn't seem to have added anything. Play the flash game instead.

First of all, to be fair, I played the competition entry at Jay is games .com, and it appears there is a version 4, which MAY have fixed some of the issues with this game.

First of all, I had some issues taking objects (which I assume was bugs, but magic is involved, so who knows). For example, If i try putting something (Which i'm carrying) into something (like the chest), it tells me I need to be holding the object before it put it into something else. (But I am!) I was also able to drop carried objects, but not pick them back up (because they were too large?).

Another frustration was spells. I went some time before I realized I even HAD any (the about section references this- yes, you're a wizard, but it implies throughout the game that wizard's are more like potion-making alchemists than spellcasters).

Next there's the directions. It's a kind of one-room game, with a central area, and a north, west, and east side of the room. It would have been nice if going N from any room took you to the north end. But if you're in the west area, North gives an error about the magical barrier around you, which NE does not.

Frustrated about the chest, I tried putting all in the chest. The ALL list apparently includes everythign i can interact with, including myself, light, shadows, etc. These items don't show up under GET ALL.

Then there's how some verbs are programmed. [spoiler] I tried griniding the cork with the pestle, where it tells me that the cork is too strong to grind. Likewise when you try to smash a wine bottle with a hammer. The walkthrough tells me I'm supposed to both hit and grind rocks with the hammer and the pestle, which was bothersome. Why would I hit rocks if a glass wine bottle was too hard for me to break with a hammer?[/spoiler]

Despite all this, the writing was a saving grace for this. I am a fan of the fantasy genre, and I like the premise, very zorkian style humor: the other wizards will yank your spellcasting license if you don't make some new wizardry advances, and they're timing you to make sure you do it. I think the timer could have gone without (we won't be able to beat the game without making the potion).

I'm giving this 3 stars. The writing is 5 star material, as far as I'm concerned. The implementation was probably 1 star, but I'm granting the author the benefit of the doubt that s/he went back and fixed many of these issues for version 4.

I welcome feedback on the puzzles as well, and can provide any hint information via email [email protected]

This game drops you in an empty room. Not only do you not know how you got there- you don't know who you are, which begs the question about why you're even trying to escape.

The game consists of examining various objects until something changes. The changes are arbitrary- sometimes if you touch a box it will turn into an arcade machine, or if you examine a panel, a switch will appear. The game basically has you examining various things until the next flag triggers and you have something new to mess with.

There is no real story to speak of, so anyone looking for any of that will be disappoined. The escape puzzle is random and arbitrary, being neither intuitive or hinted. Nor is this truly a one-room game. (Spoiler - click to show) At one point you go to an alternate "black room" . It's impossible to get stuck in this game, and the game isn't difficult at all, since there are not many things to interact with at any given time. Some things are cheap. (Spoiler - click to show) Examining a board says there's an indentation. Examining the indentation says "it's just big enough to fit the screwdriver in it." Though the game never tells you the screwdriver is there on it's own. . In fact, many of the changes in the room aren't reported by the parser until you examine the item that changed.

It's an experiment in evolving atmosphere, but perhaps if the atmosphere had some reason to evolve, or some point it was trying to make, it would be better. I use Shade as an example, becasue the atmosphere changes as well, except that at the end it starts to all make sense. This game never gets to the making sense point.

The help file is funny, as the menu options have humerous responses, but it isn't overly helpful.

The game seems more suited to a programmer than to a player. Surely it was an interesting endeavor to code, and if you think about the coding exercises, it might be interesting. But with no plot, a linear and arbitray solitary puzzle, and no personality to the protagonist, you have to wonder "what's the point?". I would reccommend putting some kind of explination as to who/what you are, and why you're in this room, what the room is, and why you need to escape, or at least a reason why everything is changing out of the blue.

I keep seeing on message boards posts about making IF more attractive for beginners. This does that.

First of all, it takes a fairly familiar topic: fairy tales. You're helping little bo peep find her sheep by wandering around fairy tale land and meeting various other characters: little red riding hood, goldilocks, hansel and gretel, etc.

The parser is flash based, making it easy to put on webpages, and the names of people are printed in red, the names of objects in orange, and the exits are listed at the end of the room descriptions in cyan. It makes it very easy for the player to navigate. In gold, special commands (like help) are mentioned in the intro, to draw attention to the help command for newbies.

The quest itself is fairly easy. You walk around and TALK TO people, and ASK people ABOUT SHEEP. Some people will give you items, which are generally needed to appease other people and get sheep, at which point you lead the sheep back to bo peep.

Some veterans might be minorly annoyed by the lack of "examine" or "X" rather than "look at", but that might just be me being lazy. I would reccommend that this be the game you choose to sit down with a friend who has never played IF before, and play togther as you introduce new people into the IF genre.