Ratings and Reviews by streever

This story is a puzzle-light spoof of 1950's (and modern!) stereotypes and tropes.

None of the puzzles are particularly difficult, and primarily consist of 'find the right object' type quests, with simple but fun secondary mechanics. There are any number of red herring objects (based on one play: it's possible they have more utility or alternate puzzle solutions) that add a sense of depth and contribute to the comedic themes.

The dialogue is fun and peppered with classic 'old-timey' declarations--when you are offered the chance, try saying the 'worst' swear your character can imagine.

The writing is concise, terse, and flows nicely: this is a piece that has clearly been edited & written for readability, and the effort is greatly appreciated.

This is a complicated piece; I'm not sure how I feel about it, and I'm not sure that I can give it a star rating. It's a challenging piece on a number of levels, and I think it really should be played by someone aware of the challenges, and with the author's notes, which I found moving.

In a sense, it's a parody, but in a more important sense, it's a social commentary on games and power fantasies that go unchallenged & are too easily fulfilled.

Groover strips away chance here, and much of the narrative abstraction that lets a player feel comfortable with their choices in most games, in a way that hopefully makes a statement about the deeper issues that are implicitly raised in this work.

This piece opens with a strong and novel take on a standard interactive fiction trope, introducing the character to the world and the situation in a natural, engaging way.

This piece plays with dreams, memories, and experiences in a way that is highly rewarding. Although I have not managed to attain the 'good' or 'best' ending, which I suspect exists, I found the entire story to be satisfying and would recommend it.

The experience is fairly short, and it really makes the most of a constrained world and a linear plot; I had fun failing in my attempts to break away from the foreshadowed ending.

Akabane Nights is a fairly small, short experience that convincingly creates a sense of greater depth and openness.

The story is told from the perspective of a vampire who wakes up and seeks sustenance from human prey; major decisions which involve conflict and causing harm to others are mixed with mundane day-to-day decisions about showering and basic hygiene.

The contrast of the serious and the inconsequential creates a deeper experience, and makes the otherwise alien perspective more relatable and human.

The author has included atmospheric gifs of dark, moving city scenes and other small graphical flourishes which break up the otherwise dense text nicely, but the type could use additional formatting; it's small and at times straining to read.

The sense of place is strong; I felt as if I was actually exploring an unfamiliar city and learning about it.

The choices are strong, and well-telegraphed; this is not a piece that relies on sneaky choices or tricks. In all, it's highly recommended.

The World Turned Upside Down is well-written and rather short; it seems to build on the worlds depicted in Cape & Mere Anarchy, but I didn't feel the connection.

The world-building is as spare as it is in Mere Anarchy, and it's effective at creating the sense of something deeper; however, this work seems to struggle to create a sense of character, which surprised me after the success of Anarchy & Cape in creating a very believable protagonist and side characters. The side characters are interesting and I want to know more about them, or see what they think about the main interaction between the protagonist and the visitor, but we don't get to, and I can't help but feel that we're missing an important chance to learn more about the story and the experience.

You are immediately informed that you can finish the game with only 3 commands; wait, interject, and examine. Examine gives slightly more context, and interjecting vs waiting changes the ending, but I couldn't really understand the motives or outcomes here. I played through Cape & Mere Anarchy thinking I was missing some crucial context, but I didn't find it. I may have missed something important, but I was left with the sense of an unfinished vignette that takes place somewhat related to the other two stories; I could see this story as a unifying episode establishing a link between the other two, or as simply a side story in the same world.

Ultimately, the story-telling is good, the writing is solid, and I recommend this short game; I'm looking forward to whatever comes next & hope that we can learn more about the characters and situations in this world.

Cape is an engrossing take on the superhero genre, avoiding or subverting many of the worst tropes, while remaining faithful to the more noble themes from the genre.

Bruno Dias explores themes of class conflict, gentrification, and the corruption of authority in this impressively long choice-based game. Interactive elements feel meaningful and clearly telegraph your agency as you tell the origin story of a superhero.

There is no sense that you're closing off parts of the story, and the writing is fairly clear around choices, so you may or may not feel a need to play this one twice. I felt completely satisfied with my choices; the excellent writing made all of my decisions well-informed ones, and the sense that the story didn't change (just my character) left me feeling satisfied that I'd learned all there was to learn.

Plot-wise, the climax was less satisfying than expected; the writing is solid throughout (both in characterizations and plot development), but the ending feels somewhat quick and unsatisfying. This may be a very subjective bit of criticism; others may enjoy this as a self-contained setup for future stories (which seems to be the intent), but I couldn't help but feel like the pacing loosened up at the end.

To be frank, this is a quibble, and shouldn't detract from the rest of the experience. Cape is friendly and welcoming for newcomers and veterans alike, and is an excellent way to spend your time. I highly recommend it.

Mere Anarchy is a fairly short work of solid prose writing and descriptions.

Dias leads the reader through a hidden world of magic, where class divisions and privilege allow murder with impunity, and the upper class, elite, wizards practice a might makes right ethos.

The basic plot points seem fairly fixed; most choices seem to resolve more around how you see your actions. Are you seeking revenge or justice? Do you have an optimistic view or a nihilistic view? Much of the story is told through hints and style, creating a sense of curiosity and wonder.

Thematically, the story is reminiscent of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere or China Mieville's Kraken; the class conflicts and hidden world concepts in particular work well in this format and with this type of spare storytelling.

There are a few game elements; a meter tracks your inventory and status, which includes descriptions like "Cautious", "Healthy", and "Steady". I didn't find much utility in these stats, but I suppose they add something to the overall feel and flavor; this is ultimately the only area of criticism in this otherwise excellent work. I'm not sure why it's an interactive story and not a short story; the style and prose would provide for an engaging short story that would likely find a larger audience outside of the world of interactive fiction. This criticism could apply to many works of interactive fiction; it stuck out here because the game elements felt grafted on. I do think it's a strong work of interactive fiction, and the interactive elements work and feel solid; it's the UI elements that felt a little off.

This piece is still strongly recommended; well-written, compelling, and engaging, I suspect this story could appeal to anyone.

This is a short little game where the player repeatedly shoots robots until the end; it's repetitive in the same way that a classic FPS game is, but missing any real sense of interactivity or agency.

This isn't completely new ground; a number of other IF games have explored the repetitive nature of FPS games, and they've done so in more interesting or subversive ways. 'Flowers to womans, guns to mans' for example plays with gender roles and uses poor English to imply that stereotypical gender roles and limited ideas of game design come from an uninformed or uneducated perspective.

I wouldn't recommend Bullets talk faster to someone who enjoyed 'Flowers to womans', though, because it has a number of issues. The writing is somewhat stunted and halting; this may be because I played the English language translation from the Russian original. It's possible that the Russian prose is far more developed, fluid, and natural, but the English translation feels artificial. I also struggled to find original ideas or novelty; despite several playthroughs with variations in my choices, this game seems to have a completely linear structure with no variations.

Ultimately, I have to leave this review as unfavorable, but I encourage the author to keep trying & to keep exploring their narrative voice.

I am a human reviewer. The function of a human reviewer is to review humans.

A normal human activity at this juncture would be to provide a review of the human, Birdland, but Birdland is not a human. Birdland is a sublime and transcendental experience created by the human Brendan Patrick Hennessy.

Birdland tells the story of a young human woman at a summer camp, where she is experiencing human emotions of melancholy, isolation, and loneliness, and she dreams that she is in a strange world of birds who ask her puzzling questions about common-place experiences each night.

These dreams affect her daily moods, which in turn close off or open up different actions she can take.

A large cameo/guest-appearance by Bell Park, Youth Detective, is a delightful reference to Hennessy's last game, but absolutely not required reading.

I can't say enough good things about Birdland; the formatting, style, design, and narrative are all excellent.