Reviews by Vivienne Dunstan

Now for a detective hunt, where Egyptian king/deity Osiris tries to figure out who killed him. I knew who did this according to Egyptian mythology, but approached the game afresh. Though I was willing to deploy that knowledge if necessary!

It’s a fun exploration, where you interact with Egyptian gods and royalty, to try to figure out what happened to you. There are light puzzles to solve, and different locations to go to. And I found it a nice intro to Egyptian mythology.

I liked the ending that I got, but I ran into a big bug with the text display. I use Safari on my Mac, with an effective 1024x665 resolution to make text big. Then I zoom into it in browsers more. After a certain late point ((Spoiler - click to show)when I had challenged Set to be my murderer), the screen would fill with text but be unscrollable, and the next click buttons would be out of reach. I was able to work around it initially by reducing the text size, and also changing the resolution to have more pixels. When that stopped doing enough I found that using save/load would give me a temporary respite, refreshing the display at each load. And that way I was able to play to the end. But it was a pity it finished that way.

But apart from that I enjoyed it a lot. I played for half an hour, exploring most options.

(Note this is a review of the game version available part way through the competition)

This is a fantasy parser game, where you’re a court wizard, and have a number of tasks to complete. It’s an ADRIFT game, so on my Mac I ran it in FrankenDrift.

I liked a lot about this. The task list for the player was a big help, though I missed completing one ((Spoiler - click to show)watering the plant, which to be fair I hadn’t even really registered) on my play through. It’s nice to get a sense of progress as you play. The parser was solid and there were helpful in game hints available if you got stuck. Which I really appreciated when I struggled a bit with the words for one puzzle ((Spoiler - click to show)trying FILL MUG and POUR KETTLE IN MUG before the H hint command suggested POUR INFUSION INTO MUG). The world is richly described, and although you only use a small number of rooms it’s immersive, generally smoothly coded, and your interactions with the various NPCs work well.

But it was just too short for me. I wanted so much more! It felt like the opening teaser for a game, rather than the full thing. Indeed as I was rattling off tasks on the to do list I realised this wasn’t going to take me very long at all. I played well under half an hour, and apart from one lingering puzzle played it to completion and the end of the game. To be fair it’s the latest in a series of games in this world. But give us more to do! I enjoyed playing this character. And expected a much more time heavy game from the hour and a half estimated play time on the competition listing.

This game is coded with Gruescript, so memorably used by Robin Johnson to write Detectiveland which he won IFComp with. As a result this game too is a sort of parser/choice hybrid. At the bottom of the screen you get a status section, showing where you are, exits you can use, objects you can interact with and verbs you can use on them. The main response text of the game appears in the upper part of the window. And neatly there’s an in game map you can show if you want to. And that updates as you play more.

In the game you’re a young child exploring the forest on your own to gather samples and photographs for a school project. And the game is about exploration. But also light puzzles. You find objects that you want to photograph and/or collect for your school project. But equally you find other objects that you can interact with, and puzzles to overcome.

I really liked a lot about this, though I don’t think I played it as deeply as I could have done. At one option I was given the choice of continuing exploring or returning home. I went for the latter. Quite a number of scary things had happened before this, and “child” me wanted to get back to the safety of home! So maybe there’s more out there that I might have uncovered. But I really enjoyed my exploration of the world. And the interface was neat.

Unusually for this author this is a Twine piece, though using word puzzles and limited locations. It also has neat inventory management, and quite a streamlined interface.

However I wasn’t someone who could really understand what was going on. The game is based around spoonerisms. I had to google what that was again. And even then I still didn’t find the word manipulations at all natural.

The game starts “You’ve heard legends of a valuable trail stash 'round these here parts.” Was “trail stash” a spoonerism? Because I don’t know what that is either. Not a great start! Oh and I tried googling it, but that didn’t help.

After that I did a pretty extensive exploration of the branching puzzle tree, picking up objects as I found them, and trying using them in different rooms. This unlocked more parts of the game, and the map pieces I needed to collect to guide me to the treasure. As I got further in matching objects with the locations became easier. Though I’m still sure I wasn’t getting any clues from the spoonerism side of things.

In the end the game ended a little surprisingly. But I did quite like the ending.

But I don’t think this is a natural game for me to be comfortable playing. I have dyslexia type problems and other huge cognitive issues from my progressive neurological disease. So anything based hugely on word play is just a big problem for me.

But it was neatly implemented, and a quick play. I liked the way it marked off locations as you solved them. And if you do like these sort of word puzzles it might click more. Just not for me sadly.

Next up this parser game, which turns out to be a tight time-based puzzler about how to survive a sinking ship, and successfully throw a lot of pirate loot overboard despite the wishes of your pirate Captain and so much else.

I liked a lot about this. The writing is really funny. I also had a lot of “Aha!” moments (e.g. when I realised I could type (Spoiler - click to show)BAIL - yup a bit slow here!). For a one room game it’s remarkably full of detail and content, and so much that is amusing. I had honestly thought I might find the pirate stuff a bit much and overwhelming (!?!), but it was so amusingly written, and the balance of it all is perfect. The anguish of the Captain each time I managed to successfully throw something overboard was just a joy to read.

There were a few things that made the game extra tricky though, trying to find the right command to make the parser understand. For those I ended up having to use the HINT command to figure out exactly what to say. There was some frustration there, including sadly at the very end of the game.

But overall it was a really strong game. I didn’t realise there was another one in the same series (a sequel to this!) written long ago. I need to check that out now too …

Also kudos to the author for including one of my favourite musical instruments in this game. One day I will own my own. Oh yes!

This choice-based piece coded in Ink sees you try to fix your mum’s printer problems, remotely, via video chat. There are lovely graphics throughout accompanying the story, and also showing your mum’s facial reactions as you work through the process.

This was really heart warming. My octogenarian mum has never used a computer and never will. Or a smartphone. So it’s not a situation I’d find myself in. But I instantly felt at home as the player character. You could choose to play it various ways e.g. be abrasive / offhand, or try to be more helpful. I went for the latter option. And I really wanted to solve the problem. Which I managed in the end. Phew!

It was nicely done. I played it through in about 15 minutes, very quickly. The writing was strong, and worked well with the graphics. And the balance between parent-child interaction and problem solving was very nicely done. Thanks to the author!

(Note this is a review of the game version available mid competition)

This parser game sees you as a clown - armed with clown car, bendy balloons and custard pies - trying to beat a mysterious Phantom who is messing up the circus shows.

This was a lot of fun. Full disclosure: I used the walkthrough a bit to speed through some of the puzzles. There are also comprehensive in game hints. And it’s really smoothly coded.

The core part of the game centres around 3 main puzzles, which can be tackled in any order. After that there’s more to play.

The NPCs are neatly written and characterful. Interaction generally works well with them. And there is clever use of a limited number of objects scattered around the circus. One of the big puzzles especially is just sheer genius ((Spoiler - click to show)the goose one).

Nicely done. I do have a soft spot for a comedy themed game. Thanks!

This parser game sees you as a barbarian king, try to avenge the loss of a friend, and defeat an evil enemy.

This was really something special. The implementation isn’t flawless, but the way that it uses a special gameplay command to change the narrative - without going into spoilers any more about this! - is something I don’t think I’ve ever seen in a piece of IF before. Initially I was a bit puzzled about what to do at a certain point, then went “aha!” and carried on. And it was enormous fun. I played right through to the end, in about an hour.

Because you are a barbarian you have special commands like SMITE and LOOT. That reduced verb set worked well. But I was most wowed with the world building, the playing with the narrative (which I want to talk so much about, but am trying to stay spoiler free), the use of locations, and the writing of various NPCs.

There’s no detailed walkthrough included with the game itself, but if you get stuck HINT will be a big help. Though at a key point you still have to figure out what to do for yourself.

Yup, that was good! Oh and there’s a story mode you can turn on to step through the game at any point if you get very stuck. I didn’t turn it on though, and enjoyed solving for myself.

This is a choose your own adventure piece exploring the experience of having a psychotic episode (or more than one …) and how you might deal with it. It’s presented as a PDF with active clickable links. Or it can be printed out and read that way.

It definitely made me think about things in a new way. Each time you experience a psychotic episode in the game it feels like an escalating situation, despite much that you try, where the panic is visceral, and it’s not clear what to do. Ultimately time and experience gives the player perspective, and I was eventually able to break out of the loop and get a better ending. Though I’m very unsure how representative that is of real life generally. I’d also have felt more comfortable if the game’s information was coming from a mental health professional (apologies to the author if I am mis-representing you here).

It’s a quick read anyway, and worth your time, either in the PDF version or printed. And it’s likely to make you want to read more about how you might help someone in this situation. Thanks to the author, and to artist Gina Fringante, whose drawings in the PDF were delightful, and really captured the mood.

This is an atmospheric horror parser game, where you play a film actress, and end up caught in a bizarre series of events in 1970s Venice. If you’ve seen the film Don’t Look Now it absolutely has the feel of that. And the terror is real. Especially for me as a woman playing. Yet it was still an appealing world that I felt happy to be immersed in, as much as I didn’t want bad things to happen. Venice is one of my favourite places in the world. We go there in the depths of winter, when it’s so spooky. And quiet.

Where the game falls down is in the implementation. Timing is critical in many scenes, so it’s a special problem if you run into fight the parser problems. So many logical alternative commands are not supported. It makes it less smooth to play than it should be. There are also quite a lot more typos than I expected. I wonder if the game writing time was a bit tighter than the author might like. More playtesting could definitely have helped.

However it was a very atmospheric game. It captured much of the Venice I recognise. And I enjoyed playing. I just wish the implementation had been a bit smoother.