Reviews by OtisTDog

Author Marshal Tenner Winter seems to have made something of a personal cottage industry out of adapting modules from the Call of Cthulu RPG into interactive fiction. This work is his first attempt, but the "call of cthulu" tag shows that he followed The Surprising Case of Brian Timmons with no fewer than four other titles, all published in 2013. This group represents about a third of Winter's entire catalog.

The pace of production speaks to a certain hastiness and consequent inattention to quality that is abundantly evident when playing this game. The writing is of lackluster quality, and implementation is extremely minimalist in nature. Scenery items are frequently missing, significant bugs abound, and tone and mood are almost comprehensively mishandled.

In 2013 there was already a model implementation of the core concept (i.e. an adapation of a CoC module) in the form of The King of Shreds and Patches. That title, which features a deep and carefully polished implementation -- is admittedly a tough act to follow, and its author, Jimmy Maher, has spoken about the vast amount of work required to create it. Based on the relative development timelines, I would estimate that at least ten times as much work went into producing The King of Shreds and Patches, and the difference between the two results is like night and day.

To be fair, Maher seems to have been attempting to recreate the sense of illusory freedom that is offered by a tabletop RPG, and he succeeded brilliantly in part through judicious trimming of the possibility space to reduce the burden of implementation while preserving elements of apparent player freedom. Winter's approach to adaptation seems to have been to curtail player freedom so severely that "on rails" is a generous characterization. (On a train, one would at least expect to be able to get some enjoyment from the scenery passing by.) It's a reasonable approach, but attempting to impose a linear sequence automatically undermines the emergent narrative that the module is designed to produce. The author is saddled with the task of crafting a single, coherent storyline out of the multiplex possibilities that can result from different player choices in the RPG version.

I'm sure that task can be done well -- after all, for a well-designed module any one path should be satisfactory -- but it is not done well here. Lovecraftian horror is heavily dependent on suspense arising from the slow buildup of the protagonist's understanding of the true situation. The crisis point is essentially metaphysical in nature, and arrives when the protagonist must accept a radically different order of existence, typically straining his or her sanity to the breaking point (or beyond).

You won't see that in this tale; the protagonist is beyond hardboiled and reacts not at all to the horror. Since the most interesting thing about the premise is the promise of blending horror and hardboiled detective tropes, this is a disappointment.

Infodumps are antithetical to tension, and this game lives by them. Character "interaction" comes primarily in the form of monologue. In a messy room full of books, the only one of plot significance is the only one implemented. Location descriptions are handled with minimal text that does little to evoke dread in the player.

The final sentence of the game is really the most entertaining part, and it wouldn't surprise me if it was inspired by something that happened in a real-life playthrough of the module in question. However, despite being an unexpected gem of humor, it's a poor ending to this particular story -- can you think of any other Lovecraftian tale that ends in a laugh line?

Despite its flaws, I would recommend it to any author interested in producing this type of adapation. The flaws are what make it a worthwhile study, especially when compared and contrasted with The King of Shreds and Patches. However, The Surprising Case of Brian Timmons falls so far short of its implicit animating vision that I can't recommend it as a play experience.

Hangman's Gulch, despite the ominous title, is a player-friendly old school parser light puzzler.

Although given a coat of Western genre theme paint, it is basically a short treasure hunt built out of classic text adventure tropes. The nature of the treasure at first seemed reasonably related to the fictional time and place but soon drifted into the exceedingly unlikely. This does not matter in the least -- again, it's an old school parser treasure hunt game.

None of its Tab A/Slot B puzzles are particularly difficult since strong hinting is provided in the game's main text. Although a >HINT feature is implemented, the player is unlikely to need to use it, and if used is likely to be disappointed. (The only hint I got from it was a restatement of the obvious.) Most of the things needed by the protagonist are left conveniently abandoned somewhere in the newly-created ghost town in which the action takes place. Others arrive through unexpected chains of cause-and-effect, such as answering riddles or feeding animals. Aside from their unexpected outcomes, puzzles are rooted in real world concerns and amenable to straightforward reasoning; there's not a hint of moon logic to be found. A few items can be used for more than one purpose, which is a nice touch.

There are several animal interactions in this game, giving it an occasionally cutesy feel that may appeal to kids. (Note, however, that violence toward one of them -- a type considered dangerous -- is required to win.) Caffeinated beverages also figure more prominently than might be expected for a Western, with the largest point award in the game being given, surprisingly, for brewing some tea.

Mechanical quality is high, as is typical for a game published by author Garry Francis. I encountered one trifling error (attempting to (Spoiler - click to show)>READ SIGN IN MIRROR) and might quibble about some of the responses to unsuccessful actions (e.g. (Spoiler - click to show)>TIE ROPE TO JUG and >TIE ROPE TO KETTLE) as missed opportunities to provide additional hinting or allow alternate solutions, but these are minor and do not detract significantly from the overall experience, which leans minimalist and focuses on the gameplay essentials.

Overall, this game is a solid introduction to the old school style and a suitable introduction to puzzlers for someone new to the idea. It's also a good choice for someone in a nostalgic mood who wants some amusement during a lunch break or commute.

Mike Russo's entry in to 2024's Really Bad IF jam is truly impressive. It is a very short, very stereotypical fantasy game in the sense that it provides the player an objective reachable with a few minutes of exploration, and it pays off appropriately in amusement delivered.

At first, the major complaint is that it's too short. Though overcoming the minor obstacles presented is too perfunctory an exercise to constitute a real challenge, it is a perfectly serviceable micro-entertainment -- so much so that it was summarily disqualified as not being bad enough to qualify for the jam. It's not enough that the player feels a bit cheated by the game's failure to continue the scenario past the point where it stops.

"Cheated" is a loaded word. Russo only makes an implicit promise here, and one could argue that the apparent promise is just an unintended side effect of the author's naturally engaging style. However, I believe that dangling that promise is intentional -- leaving the player wanting more certainly provides the impetus to take the game up on its offer when it ends with an invitation to examine the source code.

At this point, the work transforms entirely, moving from the style of classic fantasy RPG to pure horror.

The underpinnings of this work are just... horrendous from a coding perspective. Russo assiduously avoids using any of the tools in Inform 7's toolbox for its correct purpose. With a certain malevolent genius, he implements a consistent (if consistently awful) collection of misuses, assembled into a structure that, like Frankenstein's monster, invokes a deep repulsion (if also a dread fascination) simply by functioning at all.

I've often seen it said that one doesn't have to be a good coder to create a good game; this work is a very extreme form of proof for that argument. I don't know how much the code's uncanny framework could be extended before collapsing under its own weight, and there is no reason at all to emulate the coding style in one's own work, but many a new author can probably benefit from experiencing this work both as scenario and source. The effect might be similar to watching that infamous driver's ed film of yesteryear: "Red Asphalt".

To keep the meaning of my ratings consistent, I'm sticking to 3 stars for this one in consideration of it solely as a miniature game. However, in terms of higher levels of craft, I salute this work as a standout example of a well-executed genre twist.

[Lest the above be construed as an insult to the programming abilities of this author, who holds two XYZZY Awards, I remind the reader that the whole intent of the jam was to produce bad games, and that 'Steading delivers beautifully. I am reasonably certain that the reaction of amused horror that I experenced was exactly Russo's goal, and that only someone with a keen understanding of design principles could so lovingly craft this monster. So... Bullseye! And bravo!]

This short, very smooth little game by J. Robinson Wheeler is pretty well-developed for speed IF, and well worth the play time if you like irreverent takes on James Bond. It's not quite spoof, parody or satire, but it's definitely a comedy and a lot of fun.

I salute author J. Robinson Wheeler's ability to create such a fluid-feeling gameplay experience. Just about everything I tried was accepted and moved the action briskly along. The only place where I got stuck at all (for maybe a minute or two) was during a pseudo "boss battle" with the story's stylized femme fatale, who (fittingly) can't be handled like the string of mooks you have to wade through to reach that point.

Like all speed IF, this feels like it could have been more, but the work as it stands is complete and contains all of the essentials. Nothing is obviously missing that couldn't be considered to be filler, and leaving so much of what's non-essential to the player's imagination probably improves the subjective experience. I noted a couple of extremely minor bugs (Spoiler - click to show)(e.g. the chain securing the scientist you're out to save lingers in the room description even when dealt with), but these are excusable in a speed IF context.

If you're in an action-plus-comedy kind of mood, definitely consider firing this one up and giving it a spin. If you're not fully satisfied with the puzzleless format, then you might check out Centipede by the same author, which is similarly fluid and fast-paced but does have a puzzle to solve.

I don't know what possessed me to fire up this little pseudo-game by author Phil Riley, whose better-known works include The Bureau of Strange Happenings and the Galaxy Jones series.

This game is horrible, but know that this is a compliment, because it was produced for a competition in which being horrible was the goal. I found myself annoyed by the various (no doubt 100% intentional) shortcomings, but I had a good laugh after growing my first zapricot and (Spoiler - click to show)finding that eating it just leaves you in the position of having to grow another one, with an ever-present hunger timer waiting to kill off the PC should the player ever stop this infinite cycle.

After telling someone else about the game, I began to realize just how artfully I had been annoyed. The way that the Inform grammar lines have been defined for >DIG (and its converse) are quite funny in that it's actually a little difficult to get the parser to be so painful for the player in this particular way. It's a guess-the-syntax problem transmogrified into a genuine puzzle for someone familiar with the system. (Spoiler - click to show)(And I have to admit that I was stumped enough by the syntax for tamping that I had to resort to a decompiler. It was still delightful because I learned something new about the way the parser's "inference" logic works.)

Wherever the design looks like it might be unintentionally bad, Riley is careful to turn it up to 11 so that you know it's that way on purpose. (Spoiler - click to show)Yes, the descriptionless room named "path" north of the garden is funny. The fact that there are three more on the way to the well is very funny given the fairly tight hunger timer.

I doubt that very many people will share the perspective to really appreciate this convoluted (and involuted) joke of a game, but it's a great joke for those who do. I can't give it a very high score as a game, because -- to repeat -- it's a horrible game by design, but I can't give it a low score, either, out of admiration for the vision to reach such depths. I'll settle on 3 stars in recognition of the author having spotted and hit the target so precisely.

I don't like "chatting around bushes," so I'll be blunt: This game is a nonsensical mess. However, it very clearly does not take itself seriously, so there's no reason for the player to do so, either.

If you're in the mood for a quick lark that feels a bit like a cross between The Horse Whisperer and You Will Select a Decision, then you could do worse than this ridiculous little vignette. The combination of spelling errors, punctuation misfires, garbled phrasing, and rampant silliness where you might expect a plot is amusing enough to keep playing until you reach the end. (This takes about 10 minutes.)

If you're lucky, that will be "end of episode 1 / good ending". If you're not, then who cares, really? Chances are good that you had enough of a laugh to make "your heart rate ace" -- or at least enough to crack a smile.

Note: The title of this review and quoted phrases above are copied from the game, as a sample of what you'll be getting into.

I suppose that the title of this review could be considered as a spoiler, but since this fact of the game world was intentionally announced by author C. E. J. Pacian as part of teaser publicity in the days leading up to its release, I'm not worried about it.

Pacian's trademark creativity is on display in this short light puzzler that starts out with an eye toward comedy but slowly refocuses on drama over the course of its plot. Nothing is quite what it seems in this world, which the interactor sees in a form doubly-refracted through the twin prisms of the player character's hefty egotism and vast ignorance. Though these distortions, are, of course, deliberate obscuration of important information by the author, they're imposed in such a playful manner that the player welcomes the friction as a chance to linger longer in this highly entertaining universe.

Due to its limited parser format (accepting only nouns as commands, with an implicit >FLY TO verb), it's possible to play through the entire scenario without gaining much understanding of the game universe, but the real fun lies in trying to see through the veiled descriptions and decide what's really going on. It's this multi-level gameplay (and the story's inventively but delicately interacting plotlines) that makes Ancient Treasure, Secret Spider stand out as more than just good.

The original, produced in only five days, was terrific, and already the author has released post-competition versions to address a few minor issues that weren't very noticeable. (My own playthrough seemed 100% problem-free.) Even before these refinements, it was an excellent game to put in front of parser and/or puzzler newbies who are having trouble understanding how interactive fiction could be considered fun. For those who already know their way around, it makes a great bit of fun, sized somewhere between "snack" and "light meal" in scope -- perfect for a lunch break or a long commute.

Endymion is a work in the best tradition of science fiction, with a narrative concerning a not-quite-first-contact scenario and puzzles rooted in both mechanical and linguistic challenges.

Infocom's famous description of interactive fiction as something "akin to waking up inside a story" has often been repeated over the years, and some games (such as this one) invite that comparison on a literal level by having the story begin with the protagonist regaining consciousness. However, the more important aspect of the metaphor holds just as true for static fiction or film: Engaging with the media requires temporarily pushing aside one's own identity and adopting that of the protagonist. This allows one to vicariously feel what the protagonist feels, to experience the protagonist's trials and triumphs as though they were one's own.

That willing adoption of the protagonist's role is absolutely crucial in a puzzle game of any difficulty. Solving well-designed puzzles takes work, and players justifiably expect to be rewarded for that work. The best puzzles force the interactor to think in unfamiliar ways, to adopt a fundamentally different viewpoint than everyday life. This makes the breakthrough insight of a solution feel exhilirating, and confirmation of that insight by the game very satisfying.

Why am I boring you with this prosaic restatement of the obvious? Because Endymion absolutely nails that feeling in a manner that few games do. Indeed, in this carefully designed puzzle game, the protagonist's triumph in essence is the player's triumph; they are functionally one and the same.

The blank slate of the AFGNCAAP protagonist is perfect for the narrative, which very much feels like a late golden age short story from authors such as Larry Niven or Poul Anderson. The game design is remniscent of games such as Hadean Lands and Starcross, with the key to progress rooted in logic unique to the story but yielding to intuitions at least adjacent to everyday sensibilities.

What elevates this game to landmark status is the fabulous translation subsystem put in place to aid the player's exploration of the central mystery, that of the alien language which is quickly encountered and must be at least partially understood to reach the end. Author Daniel Stelzer significantly advanced the state of the art in IF here, crafting something that will surely be adopted by other authors in the future: a user interface that tracks the original context of all observed instances of alien words, allows the player to assign meanings to them, and produces provisional translations of alien inscriptions based on the meanings assigned.

Science fiction stories frequently portray the use of computerized translators in first contact scenarios, and Stelzer's translation subsystem is effectively one of these devices come to life and placed within the player's hands. It's a truly fascinating experience to see one's own hesitant interpretations challenged by obviously incorrect translations when encountering new inscriptions, and to try to reconcile the new data with what came before in order to replace or refine one's assigned meanings. Though I'm not a linguist, this work gave me a taste of what being one must be like -- it wouldn't surprise me if this game went viral and swept through the linguistics departments of the world's universities.

That's not to say that one must actually be a linguist in order to appreciate this game. Stelzer has released the source code for this game, and included with it is a complete translation of the miniature alien language. My own translations were significantly off in several respects, but that didn't stop me from reaching the end. Public comments by the author suggest concern that the puzzles were too hard, and if they depended on exact translation they might be. However, given that the language serves primarily to inform the game's associated mechanical puzzles, a somewhat fuzzy comprehension works well to reinforce the feel of the setting by maintaining a veil of mystery.

The capstone of Stelzer's achievement here is that the whole game was conceived and written in around five days. It's clear that the author's inspiration springs from a genuine passion for the subject matter, and I salute Stelzer for creating an experience that embodies a living spark of that passion.

Dangerous Curves lingered on my to-play list for a very long time. I had picked it up and tried it a few times, and never made it very far, mostly because -- despite being hooked by the opening scene -- I just couldn't figure out what I was supposed to be doing as the player. If playing interactive fiction is like waking up inside a story then this game, from the start of its highly-styled opening scene, always felt like waking up inside a movie... as an actor who had never received a copy of the script.

This initial disorientation is not helped by the high degree of detail in the presented setting, which has been executed in a simulationist style that was already giving way to more narrative-oriented approaches at the time of this game's release in 2000. That setting is the city of Los Angeles in the late 1940s. It is a character in its own right in this work, and it keeps its own schedule regardless of what one chooses to have the PC do. (The style is remniscent of Infocom's Deadline, but this game never depends on being in one place at one particular time.) The city has daily rhythms, in which stores and offices open and close according to posted hours, and there are even events dependent upon a weekly schedule as the game plays out over the course of several days. It's very easy to wander through this vast clockwork toy universe for scores or even hundreds of moves without hitting on anything that seems relevant.

There are solid arguments to be made that such a detailed reflection of the physical world is not worth it -- that it's at best pursuit of a false goal because the author can never get close enough to reality, or that the payoff in terms of player experience is too low given the cost in time and effort -- but there's something remarkably immersive about interactions like buying things and receiving change as a collection of individual bills and coins, or giving directions while driving around and seeing the protagonist respond with appropriate traffic maneuvers. Regrettably, these subsystems are occasionally glitchy (e.g. printing incorrect coin counts, or incorrect facings for the vehicle), but I very much admire author Irene Callaci's vision in this respect and also the enormous amount of work put into realizing it as code.

NPCs are also advanced compared to those typical for the era, being responsive to various situations and exhibiting noticeable personalities, though by modern standards they are somewhat flat. The ASK/TELL conversation model is something of an inhibition here, especially in the scene in which (Spoiler - click to show)the protagonist must wring some information from the stripper, who is an unwitting accomplice. The two verbs do different things, and because exactly what the PC says is never shown, it's not always clear what the NPCs are responding to in their replies. In addition, there is a special >ACCUSE verb that produces unique results but is easy to forget about; that command seems common to murder mysteries but to me seemed out of place here.

Conversation only gets one so far, and the main action tends toward standard old school adventurer fare, i.e. going everywhere the PC can reach, searching areas for items or information, or obtaining objects that will get past specific obstacles or prompt NPCs to say more. From time to time a multi-step puzzle rears its head, and some of these are more than a little finicky. For example, (Spoiler - click to show)I only stumbled onto the solution path for searching the Jaguar when trying to retrieve the car from the garage; the verb >HIDE won't accept the prepositions IN or INSIDE.

The sandbox-like format seems to be intended to allow multiple trajectories through the possibility space of the model world, but in practice a given playthrough is likely to take one approximating the specific track that is promoted by the in-game hint system. The way that this system operates, the player is guided forward one step at a time, with no new hint provided until that step is completed. Players are likely to consult the hint system often, because the protagonist does not share his knowledge of the game world with the player, making it necessary to explore the entire city in order to learn what's in it. Indeed, the hint system is critical to making early progress, because the first thing that looks to be worth following up (checking up on your client's alibi) seems to yield absolutely nothing in the way of further leads. Note that strictly following the hint system will not yield the full score -- yes, the game has a score, though it's so unobtrusive about it that one might not realize this is the case.

An interesting aspect of this work is that it runs right up against the 512K limit of the Z-machine version 8, which is the largest format supported by that virtual machine. Writing a game of this scale is a daunting endeavor, but my intuition is that the game might never have been finished had this limit not been reached. There are so many nuances and detail touches with a low likelihood of ever being encountered, so many places where intricate object texture is rendered, that it seems like Callaci would have been happy to make this game much larger than its current size. Certain aspects suggest a desire to expand the possibility space to allow more alternate solutions, such as (Spoiler - click to show)an abandoned drugstore which I can imagine being a place to find something to make the policeman on duty at the station drowsy. Others, such as the post office location, seem to be pure scenery. I was surprised to discover that the PC can obtain a gun which, despite gunplay being a staple of noir fiction, (Spoiler - click to show) seems to have no utility to the plot, and no purpose other than to get the protagonist arrested when held openly in various situations.

Perhaps the deepest criticism is that the various plot elements don't quite seem to hang together correctly. Although the basic outline is sound and believable, the set of supporting facts don't quite add up. For example, that (Spoiler - click to show)the mayor seems to have deposited the money obtained from his shady real estate deal without the land actually having been sold, or that (Spoiler - click to show)Lucky Larry seems to have spent an inordinate amount of time in jail instead of prison and was somehow unable to post bail on his own despite owning the strip club, or that (Spoiler - click to show)the sequence of interactions between the actual killer, the stripper, the victim and the car doesn't make much sense when thought through in detail.

Despite these imperfections, I found Dangerous Curves to be enjoyable. The writing was convincing, and the game never stopped being interesting once I had become oriented to the main plot. I remind readers that a three star rating counts as "good" in my book, and means that the game is worth playing. Players are encouraged to go to visit the move theater in-game whenever they're out of ideas, as advised in the response to >HELP; it's probably possible to complete the game without doing this, but trying to find the clues needed to reach the end will be like looking for needles in a haystack. Authors interested in mechanical realism are particularly encouraged to check out this work -- it's an extraordinary example of the style, and you can make your own judgment about which elements work and which don't.

[Full disclosure: I know the author of this work personally, and I helped with beta testing for this game.]

I have to admit that I find the yin-yang of seriousness and silliness at the heart of Anastasia the Power Pony very endearing, and I've been a fan since the debut of the first installment, A Matter of Heist Urgency, in 2022. Sequels are dangerous territory for any series; with players seeking both familiarity and novelty at the same time, the challenge to the author's creativity rises exponentially with each installment.

In the case of Anastasia, with its implicit Land of Make Believe setting, that burden is lessened somewhat. Author FLACRabbit has cleverly reserved the right to change things up at will, following whichever flight of fancy seems the most fun at the time. As with the first episode, there is an offbeat blend of tropes, though this time the main style being presented is noir. The impact of this is limited, though -- there are still many tropes from other styles tossed in, as befits the playful tone that infuses the series.

Anyone who enjoyed the original will certainly have fun with this one, which continues its experimentation in creating compelling combat scenes. Here I must salute the author for making each fight in the series a novelty that feels very different to play. However -- as fun as the combat scenes are -- the aspect of this work that most commands my attention is the music.

FLACRabbit is a musican at heart, with a strong talent for composing. A Matter of Heist Urgency incorporates music successfully, using it to set the mood for each scene and as accent to the highlights of in-game action, and also as the backbone of a cinematic flashback sequence that was added to the post-competition version. In A Smörgåsbord of Pain, the development of craft with respect to music continues, and the author finds ways to use it that I've never seen before in interactive fiction.

There are two scenes in particular for which the musical accompaniment is worth calling out. The first is a one-versus-two fight sequence near the start of the game. (Spoiler - click to show)As the fight begins, so does a dynamic soundtrack that loops, but with variants that keep it from sounding repetitive. Surprisingly, as the fight progresses, the music changes in response to the game state, an effect that keeps the music fresh throughout and undergirds the player's mood. The second is the game's climax battle. (Spoiler - click to show)In the food fight sequence, each zone's cuisine gets a background track that's complementary to the culinary style, and there's a Muzak-style tune for the central aisle -- the first one that you hear when the fight begins -- that cracks me up. Since the most effective fighting style involves moving around a lot, this helps to keep the player grounded in the imaginary space while also amplifying the general chaos of the scene a la Looney Tunes. Both scenes are written in a fast-paced style that makes it difficult to remember that you can spend as long as you like between commands.

Outside of those scenes, music is still effectively used in the same manner as the first episode, both to set the mood for each part and to act as stings for certain beats. The quality of the music has jumped significantly, however -- while the first episode largely stuck to simple 8-bit style tunes (excepting the new scenes added for the post-comp version), the tracks composed for this episode are much more sophisticated. (Spoiler - click to show)(The introduction to the scene with the Old Camel, who is probably my favorite character, really stands out here.) The overall effect of these various approaches is to create the impression of a true soundtrack for the game, not just as companion sound but at a level of genuine integration comparable to that seen in cinema.

Not content for innovation to be limited to music alone, FLACRabbit also added an eyebrow-raising multimedia effect (Spoiler - click to show)(the animated news broadcast seen in Anastasia's apartment) that almost seems impossible. Although Erik Temple's Glimmr extension demos showed similar savvy at exploiting Glulx's graphical capabilities, the code driving this effect is an independent innovation.

Pioneering works that hit their targets get special attention in my worldview, as they tend to open up new vistas of exploration that inject new vitality into the art form. It's great to see the latent capabilities of the Glulx virtual machine pushed to their limits as this work does. My hat is off to FLACRabbit for what's been accomplished here. Keep up the amazing work!