Ratings and Reviews by OtisTDog

Chlorophyll is an almost rock-solid young adult science fiction "light puzzler" that emphasizes the relative importance of writing skill over coding skill when it comes to creating memorable and intriguing IF. Even though it generally sticks to the most basic verbs and object types, it is a thoroughly enjoyable work that adroitly blends story and puzzle in a carefully-crafted balance. The result is a rare treat to experience as a player.

This the second piece that I've played from author Steph Cherrywell, following her better-known Zozzled. To me, this work is far superior to the celebrated 2019 award-winner. What Chlorophyll has in spades that its successor lacks is a fine-tuned thematic unity, which is essential to creating a compelling and engaging play experience.

The setting is rooted in the idea that, somewhere in the universe, vegetation has developed mobility and sentience, then subsequently evolved into a humanoid form. The player character is such a humanoid, but other than the green skin and attendant consequences with respect to metabolism, she is portrayed as a pretty typical pre-teen. This is possible because the culture of the plant people, who are called Xylloids, is more or less indistinguishable from the modern Western lifestyle.

Does this sound like a failure of the imagination on the part of the author? It is not -- very clearly the sci-fi aspect is just window-dressing for the narrative half of the game, which is an adventure story caught in that awkward stage of being halfway grown into a coming-of-age story. See Emily Short's review for more on this; the more substantive craft here pretty much escaped me since I wasn't the target audience. Nonetheless, the adventure story hooked me easily and got me to engage with the game half of the story.

It's there, in the game part, that the sci-fi premise shines. Who wants light puzzles and hunger puzzles in games today? Cherrywell's inspiration to combine the two as a natural consequence of the premise is nothing short of genius in my view, showing off a Plotkin-like ability to reinvigorate old tropes. As the review by Sam Kabo Ashwell notes, this novelty does not overstay its welcome, and its retirement from the player's list of concerns is very skillfully combined with a significant story beat. (This is an example of the highest-quality craft in that it was perfectly invisible to me as a player. It's only in retrospect and after having it pointed out that I am admiring this brilliant touch.)

Cherrywell's instincts with respect to exposition and characterization are laudable, as well. As others have noted, these are delivered on a steady drip-feed that rewards the mundane exploration required to find and take the measure of the puzzles. There's not a text dump in sight, and although another reviewer found the introductory sequence to be too long, I gauge it to be just about right for a beginner player -- enough turns to experiment with basic verbs like >EXAMINE and >INVENTORY without devolving into >Z.Z.Z. I particularly liked the way that the base comes into view and then is briefly out of view again -- a tiny touch that injects an element of dynamism into a scene serving primarily to characterize the protagonist's mother. (That characterization is a building block needed to enable the incipient crisis to create any tension at all, and I am again admiring in retrospect how deftly Cherrywell juggles competing needs in this sequence.)

None of the other reviewers seem to have noted that there are two winning paths through the game: one "bad" (i.e. rule-breaking) and one "good" (i.e. rule-following). The game is scoreless and has only one significant ending, so it doesn't really matter which path one takes. (The situation is such that the required rule-breaking is justified, in any case.)

This game isn't perfect. I agree with reviewer Tristano that the climax was a bit too abrupt, especially after the apparently false foreshadowing of (Spoiler - click to show)the Polithea action figure armor vest accessory and the option for a "tough" leafcut at the salon. A better action sequence for it would have been an improvement to me, but again I don't think I was the target audience. There were also some minor bugs, most notably (Spoiler - click to show)a >USE verb that is non-functional and text spacing issues of the type that Inform 7 is prone to create, and some other small issues, e.g. a lack of exit descriptions in places and a critical path puzzle solution that requires a command that smacks of the era of two-word parsers. (Spoiler - click to show)(For replacing the fuse in the underwater area, it's only necessary to (Spoiler - click to show)>UNSNAG FUSE after having brought it along in the tunnel roller.) These flaws are vastly outweighed by the overall execution. There are also a couple of bits of adult-oriented humor, but these are done well in that they are likely to go over the heads of small kids and to be only half-understood by savvier older kids. If you have concerns about these, then avoid (Spoiler - click to show)the encrypted file on the mother's computer and the engineer's calendar in the engine control room, but they are no worse than PG-13.

I recently waxed poetic about Alias, 'The Magpie' as an avatar of the subconscious Infocom ideal. This game is also an exceptionally good expression of that style, and I agree with Mathbrush that Chlorophyll would have made an excellent addition to their beginner line. Works like this are strategically important for introducing younger generations to interactive fiction, and this work is certainly going into my file of games to recommend to newcomers.

Just as a side note: I give rankings based more on a power law than a bell curve, and 4 stars means truly excellent on my scale. If you are considering playing this work and are in the mood for something in the sci-fi YA zone, I definitely recommend that you try it.

As the title promises, this game begins with the player character about to engage in a sword duel. As soon becomes clear, the word "duel" is perhaps the wrong choice, because the PC is vastly outmatched by the opponent, known as The Countess. I came close to quitting at this point, because the work presents itself as a "one move" game. However, within a handful of cycles it is revealed that the PC has certain abilities that make it possible to evade certain death.

This game serves up thin slices of rich world-building with its vivid and evocative prose. The universe vaguely resembles ours with notable exceptions. First, everyone seems to be a hermaphrodite in the vein of Ursula K. LeGuin's 1969 novel The Left Hand of Darkness. Second, magic of some sort is real, in that the protagonist is able to perform impossible feats such as (Spoiler - click to show)flying to the moon. Third, the PC has the extraordinary capacity to move about in time as well as space, which is the core mechanic by which the story progresses.

Despite a limited range of locations and significant actions, this piece presents many contemplative and memorable moments to the player, and also many interesting experiments to the would-be author. In particular, a variety of NPC conversation styles are implemented, including a unique menu-driven interface with options phrased around question words (e.g. who, what, when, etc.) and a stripped-down enter-the-topic prompt that I found to be a remarkably smooth improvement over ASK/TELL. A very large number of endings are possible, too, giving it some replay value, which is welcome in a game this short.

Regrettably, the story is at certain points needlessly transgressive, apparently for no purpose other than shock value. It's rather a shame, because it limits my ability to recommend this otherwise exceptional work. Even though it is not suitable for young adults, it's well within bounds as fare for grown-ups, so if you're comfortable with NC-17 movies, you probably won't blink at this. For a more widely recommendable work by the same author, see Toby's Nose.

I admit: Everything about this game's packaging and presentation turned me off. The cartoon scroll, the Harry Potter font, the word "Junior" in the title -- all of it screamed "edutainment for kids" to me. I saw that it had picked up a XYZZY in 2018 for Best Puzzles, but I didn't give that much credence. I figured the voting crowd had a soft spot for kids that year or something -- a lot of math people seem to like IF, after all.

I am pleased to say that I was wholly, categorically wrong about this work by Mike Spivey. While it is a game rooted in math, it's math of the most basic sort, with nothing beyond late grade school level required. The crux of the game is purely logic-based and more closely resembles assembly language programming than anything else.

One has to give credit to Spivey for his design skills here. The simple setup quickly hooked me with its engaging "commentary" from the evaluating professors, and quite a lot of effort was put into showing the ropes to the disoriented new player in a seamless manner that is embedded in the fiction. Once I began to catch on to how the game is played, I was well-hooked by the combination of new "spell" rewards and acerbic commentary on erosion of academia in the game world -- an aspect by which the art reflects life in modern times.

The most impressive thing about the design is how smoothly the difficulty curve escalates, with appropriate variation in the challenge level as new capabilities are unlocked. This is just great game design, and it does an excellent job of leading the player ever onward to greater and greater challenges. In a concession to IF Comp's design criteria, the player is able to end the game at any time, with the most natural exit points being after having passed the exam either by majority or unanimous vote of the three-person evaluation committee. This also acts as a courtesy to the player, leaving those who aren't inherent point maximizers able to walk away with a feeling of accomplishment.

I'd recommend this game to anyone who likes a mental challenge, and I'd very much recommend this game as an introduction to IF for the type of person who enjoys the puzzles that one would find in Games magazine or the like. It makes an easy stepping stone to other games like Suveh Nux or any of the many games that adopt the Enchanter spell system.

Every so often I come across a work that plays so well that I think to myself: "This is the kind of game that Infocom secretly dreamed of producing."

To be sure, it really wasn't possible to produce a work like Alias, 'The Magpie' in Infocom's time. For starters, the game file is several times larger than would have been viable back then -- with the Glulx executable taking up just shy of 1.6MB, it wouldn't have fit on a standard 3.5-inch "floppy" for PCs, let alone on any of the various 8-bit micros in use during the mid-80s. That's not to mention that the Glulx virtual machine and Inform 7 are both light years beyond their historical counterparts (the Z-Machine and ZIL, respectively). However, I'm convinced that a text-based play experience like this one is the half-conceived ideal that lurked in the back of the mind of everyone working in the games group there, as well as the mind of every player of their products. It is, as Christopher Huang puts it: "damn-well near exactly what I come to IF hoping to find."

I'm having trouble expressing my appreciation for what author J. J. Guest has achieved with this piece in a manner that doesn't repeat observations from other reviews. Shall I extoll its high-quality writing (mentioned by 5 others), how polished and well-implemented it is as a program (4 others), its exceedingly fair puzzle design (4 others), or how just plain funny it is (4 others)? How it's like being in a Pink Panther movie (3 others) or a Wodehouse novel (3 others), or how it made me laugh out loud (3 others)? This game is truly remarkable! It's a perfect example of what parser games can be when done well: cleverly-conceived, nearly flawless in execution, engaging, entertaining, player-friendly as can be, threaded throughout with restrained but deft humor, and featuring a puzzle structure that emerges unobtrusively from the situation presented and is responsive to real-world logic. So much thought and work has gone into the kinds of small touches in writing and programming that are practically invisible unless one is watching carefully for them, but which collectively (and expertly) snare your attention and draw you in to become part of the story instead of a mere observer of it. I've heard it said that the mark of a true master is that they make what they do look easy; Guest does that here on a nearly constant basis, and this work places him firmly among the ranks of the New Implementors in my mind.

In particular, I agree with the praise from Ade McT, Sam Kabo Ashwell and others regarding the implementation of NPCs. NPCs are hard, and these are superbly done. Their actions and conversations react to the environment and situational history in myriad ways that together do a much better job than average of presenting them as other actual characters in the story, and which grant the setting a "sense of the place being alive," as Ashwell expressed.

If you know someone who doesn't "get" interactive fiction, this work would be an excellent introduction to the format, assuming that the newcomer likes witty writing and slightly absurdist situational comedy bordering on slapstick. This work is a welcome addition to my "great first game to recommend" list.

There are a few places where the implementation is not quite as polished, and even (to my surprise), a genuine bug or two. (Spoiler - click to show)(The only one that leaps to mind is an error when interacting with Leghorn; the game reported that he had left, but he still appeared in the room description after that... though it didn't seem possible to interact with him.) These are so surprising by contrast that they become the exceptions that prove the rule -- in a work as sincere as this one, such minor imperfections serve only to accentuate its excellence everywhere else.

As those who follow my reviews know, I am unusually stingy with my star ratings. It takes a *lot* to rank as a five-star game in my book -- it means that the work is the best in its category or otherwise qualifies as a landmark in the form. Despite its minor flaws, I have no reservation granting a five-star rating to Alias, 'The Magpie' which is surely destined to be considered a classic for many years to come.

It has been many years since I played the first installment of the Earth and Sky series. That episode seemed to do perfectly well as a standalone entity. Although certain mysteries were left open at the end of episode 1, it is, after all, consciously modeled after comic books, which are usually designed to be satisfying as single installments while leaving various plot elements unresolved.

For comic books, the desire to sell interested readers another issue is a clear motivation for this style of story-telling. For freely distributed labors of love, the style's purpose is less clear. Given that the original did not seem to require any continuation in order to accomplish its narrative goals, I wondered why author Paul O'Brian went on to create two sequels. Having finally played all the last installment, it's apparent that the story arc of the three epsiodes was planned out from the start as a single, integrated whole. There is evidence for this both large and small. A cryptic note found in the opening scene of the first episode makes perfect sense in the context of knowledge gained in episodes 2 and 3, for example, and the flow of pacing and action works much better for the two sequels when they are considered together instead of individually.

I agree with Mr. Patient's review that this work was not quite as satisfying of a conclusion to the series as I had hoped for, and for the same reason that this work feels incomplete. The perfunctory puzzle structure is so lightweight that it often serves only to slow down the action; it's certainly not meaty enough to satisfy someone who wants real puzzles. It almost seems as though O'Brian was trying to reconcile fundamentally incompatible objectives by including them at all, i.e. trying to balance the basically puzzle-free style of the first episode with the more traditional style of the second. A part of me wonders how the story would play if it had been created as a single large game instead of three shorter works -- such a structure certainly would have granted license for an obstruction-free ending sequence in which the story is carried to its dramatic conclusion, while still satisfying puzzle-seekers with part two's exploration of the planetoid. (It would probably also have been too large for IF Comp, so in that case it may never have been made at all.)

Looking over the awards-and-honors data on the series, I find it very interesting that episodes 2 and 3 each took first place in their respective IF Comps, while the first episode managed only 8th place. In part, this seems to be a function of weaker competition -- many leading lights of the IF world sat out both the 8th and 10th IF Comps. However, it's also clear that O'Brian's skill as a programmer and system designer improved noticeably over the course of the three episodes' development, and this third installment was a genuine achievement in the Inform 6 era. As other reviewers note, it is essentially bug-free, and O'Brian put in plentiful good work to support the technical innovation of being able to freely switch between the sibling protagonists. (Spoiler - click to show)(Regarding bugs: I did note a very minor one during the fight with the "simian hunters" -- after "freeing" one of them, the text produced while freeing the other seemed to assume that the first still needed to be freed and repeated the actions.) Perhaps surprisingly from a modern perspective, the second installment (which I found to be the weakest as a standalone episode while playing it last year) received the most enthusiastic community response, being nominated in six categories and winning Best Use of Medium. The third installment received more muted treatment, garnering only two nominations and no wins. I'm not sure what to make of this, other than to note that the second installment is the most traditionally puzzle-oriented of the three -- perhaps it's primarily an artifact of the old school bias that puzzles are a central measure (even the central measure) of quality in a work of IF.

I originally rated the game as three stars, but I'm upping that to four stars in recognition of this episode's context within the series as a whole. I do think that the trilogy achieves something notable by popularizing fast-paced action sequences and excelling in its design of player affordances for the type of story that it tells. I would recommend it to anyone as a decent introduction to IF suitable for older children (or just the young at heart). I would recommend to players starting the series that they plan to enjoy all three episodes in quick succession over a few evenings -- it's easy to forget details that are occasionally relevant to dialog in later installments.

Heroes is a delightful old-school fantasy-style work that took 3rd place in the 2001 IF Comp (following All Roads and Moments Out of Time) and received XYZZY nominations (but not wins) for Best Setting and Best Use of Medium. Much has been written in other reviews about what motivated these nominations: the game's novel mechanic (the ability to play through a scenario as five different PCs) and the quality of the writing, which captures the feel of an RPG like Dungeons & Dragons while structuring gameplay via tropes common to Infocom's works.

The prose and puzzle design are both of very good quality, working together to draw the player into the mindset of each PC and develop the story in a nonlinear fashion as the player moves through the sequence of roles. The framing story is more suggested than explained, and on careful review it doesn't seem to quite hang together as a unified whole; certain facts gathered through direct observation and hearsay are in contradiction with each other. It hardly matters, anyway, because the back story largely concerns two characters that are known by each PC but who share very little "screen time" between them. On the whole the framing story feels grafted on, but it can be ignored in order to focus on and enjoy the various vignettes.

The variety of play styles presented are in general well-supported by the mechanics of the implementation in addition to the writing. Of the five stories, I found the story of the enchanter to be the most well-designed in terms of puzzle structure. It feels the most "meaty" of all of the scenarios, too, and I wished that the other four had been developed to that level of depth. From a technical standpoint, the story of the thief was also quite interesting -- a strict but game-appropriate inventory limit is offset by the fact that the PC carries various items of equipment tucked away on his person so that they are always available for use. As another reviewer noted, the premise of the "royal" PC's scenario is quite funny; I actually laughed aloud as the gaggle of mostly useless sycophants began to accumulate. This does end up being among the weaker scenarios, however, presumably because developing proper puzzles for it would have involved a substantial subsystem around NPC interaction and knowledge.

Although Barrett's The Weapon (released the same year) is one of the most polished and bug-free games I've come across, Heroes is not crafted to that standard. I encountered several instances in which reasonable synonyms for commands were not implemented (e.g. (Spoiler - click to show)you can >GET X WITH Y but not >PICK UP X WITH Y), and a few bugs of the type that should have been caught with testing (e.g. (Spoiler - click to show)the stomachful of acid that can be dropped and picked up like any normal item). Twice I resorted to the walkthroughs; once was for a guess-the-verb/syntax scenario, and once was for a puzzle whose fairness is arguable. ((Spoiler - click to show)The barrel in the pawn shop is made of metal. Only one of the five PCs will notice this, and not the one for whom it is the most salient fact.)

Despite these rough spots, I found this game to be very entertaining. The effort of keeping the "same" scenario fresh through five different versions of the key events was not trivial, but the work paid off. After completing any two of the scenarios, you are likely to be compelled to play the rest. Perhaps the enchantment of the key McGuffin -- a gem which engenders a "compulsion beyond what its mere beauty should produce" -- works upon we players as well as the PCs.

(A technical note: A slight bug can cause the initial text after "[press any key]" prompts to be overwritten by the status line. This significantly impacts the epilogue text at the end of the game. The bug is negated by the Bocfel interpreter included with Gargoyle, so I recommend that interpreter be used to play this game.)