Reviews by End Master
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A FF scifi game that’s actually okay, March 7, 2021This one was a case of I got it and didn’t play it right away. Scifi settings generally just don’t work with the Fighting Fantasy system for whatever reason.
Eventually I got around to playing it and to my surprise it wasn't bad.
This game has quite a bit of back-story to it. It goes on about how human started colonizing other planets and when they eventually encountered another alien species called the Arcadians who eventually conquered the human planets one by one.
Of course conquering and holding are two different things so the Arcadians at first had a hard time of keeping the humans in line. That all changed however when they created a super computer that would make this whole space empire thing a lot more efficient. While the entire Arcadian race was unified already, they needed that extra edge so the entire race put a chip inside their own heads to get this weird cybernetic hive mind thing going.
Of course this now caused the amusing situation that the Arcadians had basically enslaved themselves to a computer while at the same time enslaving the humans. (They did try to put the chip in human heads, but after many failed attempts, human brains just don’t accept the chip and die during the process) Things have been this way for over a century now.
What this all means is the underground resistance has built up and prepared the cunning plan of destroying the Arcadian super computer because it that goes down, that’s going to completely turn the Arcadians into turnips. Great plan, of course you’ll need to get to Arcadion first and that’s where the difficulties lie because human space travel is severely restricted unless you’re an authorized merchant and the further out from earth you go, the more restricted it is.
So naturally as a member of the resistance you’ve got the necessary fake merchant identification, but it’s still not going to be easy as you have to make contact with other resistance cells on other planets to get the necessary codes you’ll need to get access to the next planet.
And yeah, these codes already involve some Steve Jackson like number crunching.
Also despite this being a scifi setting, the combat is more like a traditional FF book. Humans aren’t supposed to have weapons so your ship is unarmed and no fancy ray guns for you. And the Arcadians are so paranoid they don’t even carry such things anymore, they just give their people laser whips and lightsab…er I mean laser swords to keep humans in line, which is a lot easier nowadays. (Naturally you’ve managed to acquire one of these laser swords and they’re fairly easy to smuggle in security checks apparently as long as nobody is looking too closely)
Though you do get a “sudden death” option where if you’re ever in unarmed combat, you can roll an extra die and if you get a six, you kill the person outright mainly because most Arcadians are a little less combat skilled and you’ve been studying their weak points for years.
Okay on with the actual meat of the game.
Basically it’s just going to one planet, meeting with resistance members, getting the codes and then moving on to the next. As if it needs to be said, failing to get the codes will result in failure of the game.
The first two planets are easily the more detailed parts of the journey and as I remember there’s a bit more exploration in general. The codes are easier to get there as well.
By the time you get to the third planet things start getting a little harder and it starts getting more barebones of getting the codes and getting off the planet. If you’re going to get “stuck” it’s probably going to be on this planet since I remember the codes being a lot harder to access here.
The final stage of the journey is going to Arcadion itself and trying to blow up their computer.
There’s a lot more backstory that’s more interesting than the actual game itself, because despite it being one of the better scifi settings, most of the encounters aren’t exactly the most memorable. The game isn’t boring, but it just doesn’t have much that stands out or at least it didn’t for me.
Not much else to say about it really. For some reason I didn’t mind the code hunting as much in this one. Probably because of the way the story was set up of having to make contact with resistance leaders and sneak your way to the Arcadian homeworld, needing important stuff like that felt more “natural” as opposed to whenever a puzzle just pops up out of the blue in the middle of a dungeon.
It’s an okay game and if you’re into scifi settings you’ll probably like it even more.
Like playing a comic book, March 5, 2021Zombie games of any kind are pretty common and have been for awhile so it’s equally common you’re going to find a lot of bad ones. ZDay is however one of the better ones.
ZDay at its core is a choose your own adventure style game, with some resource management elements. You’ll acquire weapons, useful equipment, and survivors. You can even equip these survivors to make them more effective in battle and heal them when wounded if you have healing items.
While gathering equipment and such is vital to survival, there are plenty of opportunities to die instantly if you make the wrong choice. You have an equal amount of opportunity to be killed by a zombie or other human survivors. The game always gives you a score of how likely you’d be able to survive if you were in a “real” zombie apocalypse whenever you finish the game (Usually by dying).
There’s definitely enough branching here and different ways to go about handling situations, giving it quite a bit of replay value. It plays pretty quickly too, so dying isn’t even really an issue if you’re the impatient sort that gets frustrated easily.
Probably heresy to say this for a IF game, but the comic book artwork style is what really makes this one stand out compared to similar games of its kind. Considering it was drawn by a DC artist, it’s not surprising that it seems to work well for the game. Though I can't help but think The Walking Dead comic was the big inspiration even if that was produced by a different company.
It’s a fun game, which is why it’s unfortunate that the developers never did any more with their creation. There were supposed to be expansion packs, but nothing else was created as far as I know.
Still, with what does exist within the game, there’s enough content for more than a few playthroughs.
Wait, this isn’t Orlandes, March 5, 2021While there were 12 GA books set in the same fantasy world, there actually were 13 of them. There was a single sci-fi attempt in the GA series that came out after the Spider God book. (So technically Infinite Universe is the 8th book)
Much like the Orlandes setting there is a map available in the options setting if you’re interested in getting a larger look at the setting. There’s also an encyclopedia of things like for the fantasy books, but the difference is you don’t have access to it until you play the game. (So no research before you get started)
Since this one came out right after the difficult Spider God book, this one had some of that difficulty carried over, like you only get three bookmarks rather than six. Though it still has three difficulty settings rather than just two. (Adventurer setting is called Bookworm in this one)
This one sort of does a bit of the character creation as part of the story, like picking if you’re male or female. Oddly, you don’t pick your name. You’re Joe Bloggs (if you’re male) and you don’t remember anything though someone who appears to help you brings you a bit up to speed on what’s supposedly going on. You’re a Terran Galactic Secret Service initiate and the academy that you’re in is under rebel attack.
Of course since you can’t remember anything, there’s no reason to necessarily believe what he’s saying and you can just shoot him. Always like games that give a wide variety of options.
The first part of the book is a bit chaotic considering you’re in a fire fight situation and you’re suffering from amnesia on top of everything. The writing though is a bit chaotic as well. It seems to go from humorous (breaking the fourth wall quite a bit, even to the point of self-mockery) to serious to technical, sometimes all within the same passage. It’s almost like the author wasn’t sure what he was going for, though it doesn’t bother me too much. Just makes reading through it feel a bit weird sometimes. There are a lot more random rolls in this book too which adds to the chaos.
Fighting seems a bit more lethal at times, though that might be due to shooting people with lasers as opposed to beating armored opponents with a sword. Granted both kill you just as well, but hi-tech weaponry tends to do it faster.
If you manage to survive the first part, you’ll soon learn what’s really going on and embark on a larger adventure filled with danger, time travel and a general odd writing tone.
It should be mentioned that originally this was also Tinman’s experiment with “pay to play” content since you could play the first part for free and unlock the rest after you shelled out more money. I’m guessing it didn’t really work out for them since as far as I know, they didn’t do it with any of their other GA books.
This one probably gets even less attention than the fantasy series because it was a one shot. I’d also say that it isn’t really as good as any of the fantasy books which is similar to how the Fighting Fantasy series struggled with sci-fi settings.
Still it’s not bad and I think there was potential here if the writing had been a little more focused. It’s worth at least a play through if only to see what a GA scifi setting themed series might have been like.
Surprised this one is on here, March 5, 2021The definition of “IF” is a bit broader nowadays despite the fact that many still argue over what constitutes a “True IF game.” Personally, I've never really felt the need to nerd rage about it too much since most of the purist types just come off as pretentious boomers that are more laughable than anything else.
Still, I was still surprised to see that A Dark Room is listed in the database, since it doesn’t really have any puzzles or typing in words to do something like say a Infocom game would, and it doesn’t really have a branching “pick a path” like a CYOA game would. It’s not even a weird hybrid “graphic text adventure”. Even something like Seedship or Out There have more branching choice elements.
I’d say that A Dark Room is more of a real time sandbox survival simulator with some mystery story telling elements. Choices that you make are more determined by what you need to build or where you need to explore to advance the plot as it were.
However it’s in the database now, so far be it from me to argue semantics, the game is pretty fun anyway. I particularly like the way it slowly reveals more and more of what exactly is going on and who you are.
Sometimes waiting around to click stuff can get a little dull, but the overall gameplay entertained me. Especially as more options opened up as you build more things and are able to explore the land around you.
It’s a fun diversion and worth a play through.
A hidden gem, March 5, 2021When I got this one a few months ago, I didn’t have excessively high expectations for it. I figured it might be okay at best, but something about it’s presentation just didn’t scream excitement. Of course one can never judge a book by its cover and this one is no exception. While Mizal went over quite a bit, I’ll try to add some of my own impressions.
The game starts out pretty simple using everyone’s favorite amnesia driven plot at first which will turn into a revenge driven plot as time goes on. Doesn’t sound too impressive even describing it here, perhaps even negative given how many tend to hate amnesia driven plots, but there is more going on as you discover.
The closest comparison I can make to this one would be one of the better books from the Game Adventure series. (And one that doesn’t have the crashing issues) It’s actually better than the GA books in terms of the inventory and stat pages which is nearly laid out and compartmentalized (GA books would shove everything on a “sheet” that awkwardly popped up on the side). This book has more stuff to keep track of though, so better organization was definitely a must.
The writing was consistently good throughout the game, music and background art certainly helped with keeping immersion. Your stats do come into play quite a bit and aren’t just for show. Obviously certain stats open up different possibilities or make certain encounters easier to bypass. In true RPG fashion, I used charisma as a dump stat leaving it at one, and focused on others instead. I could only imagine how much harder the combat would have been if I hadn’t.
Combat is a real time spamfest. It’s definitely the weakest part of the game. Personally I would have preferred virtual dice. Though you get different button options to spam depending on what type of weapon you have, though you usually can’t press those special options until enough energy builds up during the combat. With some you get the option to parry attacks, which you can use to prevent taking damage.
So there’s an idea of timing in involved with combat, however in practice, you’re usually just spamming the attack button and hoping for the best. This is why I think focusing on raising stats like agility and resilience, while also getting better armor, worked a whole lot better keeping me alive in the long run. In fact early on in the game, there is a piece of armor which essentially makes most of the game WAY easier combat wise. The piece of armor isn’t really easy to get though, but given that you’re able to get it fairly early in the game, it almost seems like a hidden “easy mode” to unlock.
Of course all the steel underwear in the world isn’t going to keep you completely safe, because as with all good CYOA based game, you can get instant death passages in more than one place. One major thing that you’ll find yourself doing is disguising yourself as various enemies so you can get through certain areas with less problems (or sometimes avoiding instant death). You’ll need to have the appropriate clothing of course and remembering to wear it.
Which brings me to the CYOA elements. There definitely is some branching here, though due to it following a certain storyline, you’re of course inevitably following it to its natural conclusion. It’s the journey of how you get there that’s going to be a bit different. Whether you decide to bash your way through everything or try to talk your way through some bits, depends on what skills you focus on and what items you manage to acquire.
I did find that there are at least three different “winning” endings. Not sure if there are more I didn’t discover. Wouldn’t surprise me though as the game is sizable and lends itself to multiple playthroughs. Though you get the option of four save points so if you’re strategic with where you save, you wouldn’t have to necessarily play entirely through the whole thing again.
I liked this one and would definitely try out another game made by this company.
The final episode in the GA world, March 4, 2021This is it, the last book they made in the GA series. I’m still not entirely sure why, though I can only guess it might be due to getting the Fighting Fantasy books and making more money off those instead. A shame really since as much as I like the FF series I found the GA series to actually have more interesting stories and there was still much more to explore.
Anyway, for the final outing, this one takes a cue from Lords of Nurroth, by having a bit of extra customization, like choosing if you’re male or female. You also get four extra abilities that you’ll have to test from time to time. Now the first time you play through, you’ll go through the in story process of raising your stats (which also fills out your background) however in replays, you can skip this part and just allocate points as you see fit during the character creation page which is very convenient.
Fitting for the last GA book, it starts in Orlandes City, you’re technically supposed to be an “investigator, but you’re more of a jack of all trades ne’er do well since you’re living in the slums and will do stuff like kill and torture for money.
Book starts you off right in it with someone holding a knife to your throat. Eventually you’ll be taken before the Duke of Orlandes who you’ve apparently worked indirectly for in the past. While you might start in Orlandes City you won’t be staying there since the Duke sends you on a mission located all the way to a city called Casporur on the opposite side of the continent. In fact it’s probably one of the few areas of Orlandes there hasn’t been an adventure taking place in yet.
You’re supposed to be finding out what happened to an emissary that went there along with learning more about the rumors of the return of the god Asuria and finding out if there is any truth to them. The next part goes on a bit about your training and preparation for the mission and how you’re given only the barest bones of equipment and that you’ll basically be on your own since the Duke doesn’t want to be implemented in the plot if you get caught.
Doesn’t take long before rebels seek you out since they’re concerned about all the Asuria business, along with people going missing and figure you can help them too. Of course the ruler of Casporur and his closest advisors all seem to be focused on Asuria to a cult like degree, though they aren’t completely happy with each other either. You’ll have to figure out where everyone exactly stands. who to side up with (If only temporarily) and ultimately uncover the main plot.
There’s a slight steampunk element to this one. Stuff like clockwork golems and a submarine are present. Though there is also a mild Cthulhuesque element present to this one as well due to the whole bringing up a “dead” god from the water, along with some body horror going on. They certainly didn’t hold back for this one.
While the writing and gameplay were excellent, I encountered the same crash problem I had for Songs of the Mystics. I'm guessing they didn't tweak these last two books on the technical side of things.
Again, would have been a higher rating if not for the technical issues. The game itself is very good and is a respectable end to the GA series.
Slightly off key, March 4, 2021A couple things off the bat that stand out about this one. One, this one doesn’t take place in Orlandes, it doesn’t even take place in another major land like Rema. It instead takes place on Isla Des Misticos, which sort of sits in-between Orlandes and Rema (And Drymar which is the third major land the GA books have not had an adventure taking place in)
The other major stand out, is you play as a female protagonist, as opposed to a male one which has been the case for nine of the past books (The tenth, Lords of Nurroth allowed you to choose).
You belong to a rather insular community that lives in the forest called the Mystics that defend a wellspring thought to be the source of all life. You’re the daughter of the last of the Spellsingers which are basically singing wizards. Due to Orlandes starting to colonize the island and steadily encroaching on the previously unblemished nature, your mother has decided to stop them by becoming one with the wellspring.
Unfortunately for you, she means to do this by sacrificing you in the process. Naturally you escape and the rest of the game unfolds from there. Along the way, you’ll soon discover that you also have the power of a spell singer, and you’ll gain various songs throughout. And you’ll need them too, to overcome some of the difficult encounters.
There are several paths you get to choose from fairly early as you’re making your escape so the encounters will be varied. You can fight a serpent man sorcerer, help defend a village, be captured by a traveling circus or even help underwater monsters. This book tends to take the protagonist on a wide variety of situations. Mostly seeing the effects of “civilization” on the island since you’ve never been out of your forest.
Assuming you manage survive the initial escape, you’ll eventually encounter someone who will help you more directly and even act as a new “family.” From there you’ll encounter more struggles like a plague gripping the island and eventually a showdown with your mother of course.
While the story in general is intriguing and the combat is fair, I have no complaints about this book other than it had some pretty bad crashes which I hadn’t had an issue with on previous Tin Man games. In fact it crashed to the point where I had to actually uninstall the app and reinstall it to get to work again.
Would have been a much higher rating without the crashes.
City of Thieves GA style, March 4, 2021Not a sequel to a previous book, but definitely back to Orlandes because the GA books still haven’t explored ALL the major regions of the land yet. As by the title, this one takes place in Nurroth which is located in the northern region of the land and is considered to be quite the hive of scum and villainy (Basically like FF’s Port Blacksand), so it’s even more appropriate that your character is a thief. Not an adventurer that does some thieving when down on his luck either (Like in Catacombs) you’re an outright thief.
This book is also the first to add more customization. For example, you get to choose if you’re male or female and you get four abilities that you can add a few points to at the start.
Story start off as you going about your one of your thievery jobs, afterwards you get hired for another one which naturally turns out to be more complicated than you signed up for.
One thing that stands out about this game is there are a lot more fitness and ability checks than actual fighting. In fact you should probably avoid fighting if possible since your equipment isn’t exactly the most powerful. (Though there’s one exception to that) This can make some of the actual combat difficult, but it sort of emphasizes the fact that you’re not a warrior or adventurer in this one, you’re a thief that relies on other abilities rather than combat.
As the story progresses, it goes on a bit about the city’s background from time to time and how it’s semi-held together by various clans which can barely stand one another and are on the verge of open hostilities. There’s a call back to Revenant Rising and how Saul was a member of one these clans. As if the internal conflict wasn’t enough, there’s strife with the city of Falavia as well. (Which makes sense given Saul laid siege to it at one time)
The funny thing is there is obviously of lot of stuff going on here, however as you’re a simple thief, you don’t really play a part in a lot of it most of the time. This story in the scheme of things is actually fairly short.
You can profit from being an honest thief, you can profit from treachery, you can uncover the actual secret plot and try to play a bigger role on the world stage, you can just complete the job in ignorance, and as always you suffer an ignoble fate if you really screw up. While there is one “true” winning” ending, this is probably one of the few GA books that has multiple “lesser” winning endings.
Despite this one being a little smaller in scope, I actually enjoyed this one most out of all the GA books. The multiple endings, different branches and even using different stats give this one a lot of replay value especially since it’s on the shorter side.
No major downsides to this one.
Another sequel so soon?, March 4, 2021With the ninth GA outing, this one continues the adventures of the protagonist from Slaves of Rema and plays a bit of catch up from the events in that book. From there is goes on about what you’ve been doing since your escape. Acoleii is the major Reman city state that’s been causing problems for the southern cities of Orlandes and has been mentioned in passing in a few past books about its increasing hostility.
Of course since you managed to escape from that city, now you’re considered important enough to go on a diplomatic mission to another major power in the Rema province called the United Emirates of Akbir to make sure Orlandes doesn’t have more hostile governments to deal with from that area of the world.
You start your adventure off in a Reman city state called Callae and it’s from here you must travel to the Emirates. You won’t spend too much time in Callae before you’re making your trek across the desert. As you might expect there’s plenty of danger here, environmental and the usual kind. There’s a few different ways to cross it, others being more difficult than others.
Survive the desert and then your mission continues in Amin al Joddah where you’ll have to locate your contact and hopefully expose the Acoleii plot to muddy the waters between Orlandes and the Emirates. This is where a few key important objects and information come in handy.
Much like Slaves of Rema, this one is probably about fair as far as difficulty level. Combat can be tough in places since armor is generally expensive and finding it isn’t common. Upgrading your weapon is a little easier, so this is one of those games where you might be able to his hard, but you better take out the enemy on the first try if they’re rolling a lot of dice to attack. The last fight is especially difficult if you aren’t really equipped for it, but it’s doable thanks to having some help if you have nothing else.
This one is also similar to Curse of the Assassin in that it’s a bit more story heavy, however I liked this one better since it felt a bit more focused on a single plot line. (And it doesn’t end on cliff hanger!) Plus it’s always nice to get away from Orlandes once in awhile to see other parts of this world.
Highly recommended, especially if you liked Slaves of Rema.
Back to the basics, March 4, 2021Eight books and the GA series is already making sequels to past adventures, well it was bound to happen eventually.
I guess they decided the last book was a bit too difficult so they brought back the “middle of the road” Adventurer mode and six bookmarks for classic mode again.
As with most sequels, the book plays a bit of catch up on what happened to you in the first book (Which it’s assumed you won, since you wouldn’t be in the position you’re in for this one right?) It also goes on about what you’ve been doing since which is a lot better than when you started in the first book. You have a new girlfriend that’s one of the Archduke of Orlandes’ daughters now rather than drinking yourself into a stupor.
The book not only does call backs to the book that it’s a direct sequel to, but also to major events that occurred in other books (Slaves of Rema, Revenant Rising, etc) to further create a sense of a changing world. Probably goes on a bit longer than most like, but I don’t really mind stuff like that.
The story starts off with you discovering a childhood friend has died and you investigating his apparent murder. This leads to more backstory about how this dead friend and some of your other old friends used to have an adventurer party until you all split up.
The investigation will eventually lead to traveling back to your old village, involving a visit to your parents (and the old friend’s parents to inform them of the news) and branch into three different paths depending on what other old friend you decide to seek out.
While this one starts out with a simple plot, the storyline itself gets more complex as it goes on. You’ll be uncovering more mysteries to fighting creatures thought to be just folklore. The book in general is much more packed with writing, at one point I read over 15 pages or so before moving on to a choice! Combat almost takes a backseat to the story most of the time, especially since you don’t do much equipment upgrading or item collecting. Most of the stuff you’ll be collecting that’s needed is information.
In fact, it’s entirely possible to “win” but still lose. Even with a complete victory, there’s still a bit of a cliffhanger, which is a bit annoying given they haven’t continued this series in a long time. However combined with three different companions you can potentially travel with, there’s more replay value here than past GA books.
If you don’t mind a more story oriented GA book then you’ll enjoy this one.
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