Reviews by MathBrush

This German game has an English version, Wry, which was entered into Spring Thing and which was well-received.

I actually enjoyed this version a bit more, which I guess, for me, lends credence to the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis. I really appreciated how the game led you on on what to do, and how responsive it was, in general. In addition, I saw less of the ribald fantasies in this version, as I knew less commands to try out lol.

There were a couple of minor issues; looking at the wall gave a response in English ("On the wall above the sofa hang several pictures"), and X BILDER still lists a young lady being among the pictures even when the canvas has slipped out. But overall, I found this enjoyable and fresh.

I played this game for quite a long time. This is a German Grand Prix competition game from 2022.

It's a downloadable executable that requires an up-to-date version of .NET. It's written in German, and is a custom parser game that contains 6 different windows, each with clickable links (one is the main story, one is constant links and directions, another is all objects in the room, another is inventory, another is a static room description).

The idea is that the whole game can be done either through typing or through link choices. Each object has its own set of links. Overall, it made play simpler, but frequently this led to an overabundance of links. For instance, most rooms had 7 or more furniture objects that did not matter in the gameplay. And many links were redundant. For instance, 'climb on top of' and 'get down' and 'go to' links were always there but never seemed to be used.

The story is that you are hunting Phoney, a 'hamberder' loving man who leaves behind bankruptcy claims and red hats to go through a portal where he rules an island through 'Phoneyvision'. Phoneyvision makes everything seem better than it really is. For instance, his wife is reality is a sticky blow-up doll, but in Phoneyvision she's a model.

Unfortunately, Phoneyvision only seems to work in two locations for most of the game. I had to restart once because I used phoneyvision in the wrong place and entered a void containing nothing but a rotten hamburger. I feel like it's a bit of a missed opportunity.

Gameplay mostly revolves around surviving a grim and darkly humorous world populated by parodies of Trump's associates, such as the cannibal ghoul that is also Trump's lawyer, or the poisoner/tax-collector named Middlefinger (not sure who this one's a reference to). Rotten food, mean-spirited pranks, and general filth and decay abound.

The UI has a replay option to allow you to go back to any time in your story, but every time I used it it got stuck in the first room of the replay. I tried saving, but when I closed the program and re-opened it my save wasn't there.

Overall, I think the engine is impressive but could be improved. This is part 1 of a four part story. I don't really enjoy mean-spirited humor, and felt frustrated with both my bad German and trying to understand the game's puzzles, but this game stuck in my brain so I played it for several days, getting help from the author. I'm rating it as '2-10 hours long' in my classification system, but a native speaker might finish it sooner.

This Adventuron game takes full advantage of the system's graphical capabilities. It has excellent pixel art for a multitude of characters and mini-games.

You play as a young sentient animal on a spaceship. You want to be a star, so you go around the ship talking to others and getting advice.

Most interactivity is in the form of riddles or puzzles. There is a language-to-language duolingo-like game for learning languages, a graph theory problem, a logic puzzle, a cryptogram, math problems, etc.

An immense effort has been put into this game. Unfortunately for me, most of it was put into the areas that I am not quite as interested in. As for the main play, there are some frustrations. For instance, typing LOOK won't bring up the room description again, so you have to leave and come back to find out who's there. There is a chicken wing tree, but after you pluck one off and try to eat it it acts like you don't have it. There are occasional typos that distract. Overall, I had fun, but I think the very high production quality of the rest of the game gave me higher expectations for the text-based part.

The art is the best part of the game, with good shading and 3d perspectives.

This game was entered into the 2022 Text Adventure Literacy Jam. It has some lovely illustrations and uses the Adventuron engine.

You've lost your pet dog and have to explore a spooky mansion. A tutorial helps you out to get started. Most puzzles revolve around EXAMINing things and TALKing to people. There are a lot of cute characters, like philosophical skeletons and silly pumpkins.

It's not too long, but some of the puzzles were moderately challenging. One lasted a little bit longer than I would have wished, but overall this is one of the strongest games in the competition.

Garry Francis is a prolific author, specializing in text adventures with a focus on puzzles and core parser gameplay (like GET/DROP/etc.). This game and the other one he released in the same competition (The Carpathian Vampire) show a lot of growth in implementation and puzzle design.

This is one of the smoothest games of the comp. You play as a koala who is also a bushfire warden for the surrounding wildlife. You have to provide for yourself and all those around you.

The main charm in this game is the vivid descriptions of australian wildlife and plants, with background action happening (like skinks crossing your path), a garden area with tons of plants, and puzzles revolving around Australian wildlife.

I think this is pretty great, and was glad to play it. My one desire might be for a couple of additional things to implement for consistency. One puzzle, for instance, was only solved by (Spoiler - click to show)the verb ASK [person] ABOUT [something], while a later puzzle had a character (the owl) who didn't respond to ASK OWL ABOUT [topic] for most topics that mattered; instead, this was a TALK TO puzzle, which was somewhat inconsistent with the earlier puzzles.

This is an Adventuron game written for the Text Adventure Literacy Jam. It's parser based and has you diving into the ocean, exploring for treasure.

Here's my rating:

-Polish: I feel like the game could be brushed up a bit. The tutorial isn't reactive; instead you have to type RUN TUTORIAL separately in two rooms, and in one of those rooms it just lists several turns' worth of info, whereas other tutorials in this comp reacted to your actions. Similarly, more synonyms could be added.
-Descriptive: Many objects weren't described. The descriptions in the game are easy to picture, though.
-Interactivity: This game involves guessing the verb a lot. For instance, opening the chest: (Spoiler - click to show)OPEN CHEST and UNLOCK CHEST don't have meaningful responses, but PLACE GEM does. And after you open it, (Spoiler - click to show)TAKE LIGHT, ENTER LIGHT, LOOK IN LIGHT, SEARCH LIGHT, ENTER CHEST, none of it works, except for TOUCH LIGHT.
-Emotional impact: It was hard to connect with the game, because I was frustrated.
-Would I play again? Same as above.

The game isn't that bad overall, but I wish that more people had tested it and that things the testers tried were implemented. If that had happened, I would definitely give this game a higher score, because it has a lot of good ideas; it's only bug-fixing and adding more responses that I think it could use.

This game has the same storyline shown from multiple points of view. As you complete an easy one, a harder one unlocks. In an amusing twist, the 'help' system for each difficulty level is the PC of the next difficulty level. It's an adventuron game, and comes with a built-in map.

Each difficulty level is linear, solving one room at a time before unlocking the next room.

I found the puzzles pretty hard as the game went on. The first difficulty level wasn't too hard, but I couldn't figure out the wordplay puzzle in the second difficulty without the walkthrough (I had tried (Spoiler - click to show)GLASS and 4-letter words without success). I also had deep trouble with the wire problem, especially since the solution relied on a word not in the verb list, and the cake puzzle, well, I'm not sure how it worked even after the solution. This isn't bad, necessarily, since being stuck is a feature of puzzles, but I definitely did get stuck; other reviews say they had no problems in this game so it's probably just me.

Overall, the game was entertaining. I would have preferred some simultaneous puzzles so I could work on one while being stuck on another. I found the writing was clear and set the scene well in most problems.

This game has a pretty unusual format. It's a .exe file entered into the Text Adventure Literacy Jam, and it features a bar for typing in parser commands as well as hyperlinks to make play easier.

I used just the hyperlinks, as typing was unusual. It may have been just me, but it seemed like I couldn't hit enter and get a response unless it was an acceptable command, which was weird because I couldn't tell if the game was lagging or if I just didn't have the right command.

The links operate by single-clicking for directions, double-clicking to use items or pick them up, and clicking once on one item and once on another to use them together.

The puzzles are fairly simple, mostly exploring and grabbing whatever you command. Finishing one puzzle generally unlocks the next.

I had a couple of frustrations. The text color was similar to the background image, making it hard to read. Text scrolling with a mouse was required, but the mouse wheel doesn't scroll. And there are some text mistakes that make things confusing.

This is an adventuron game with a two-word parser and tutorial designed for beginners.

While many games in this comp seem to lean towards younger children's interests, I feel like the pirate story is not really childish. Instead, the author provides an interesting backstory for an island with magical creatures and enemies.

Most of the gameplay, though, is centered around solo exploration. Some puzzles have multiple solutions, which is neat.

A lot of work went into worldbuilding and into a tutorial that is helpful at suggesting verbs and giving expectations for the parser.

Overall, I wonder if it could have been a bit more fleshed out. It's actually more substantial than many games in the comp, and being shorter is better for beginners, but it felt pulled in multiple directions by seeking to be simple and short but also to do epic storytelling, which would have benefited from a bigger buildup. I had fun, though!

This feels kind of like a game for the author to experiment with and/or learn ADL.

It's a .exe file that leads to a simple game with < 10 rooms. Most rooms have 1 item. There are several characters you interact with using TALK CHARACTER. Instead of GIVING items, you PUT items in different places. The game ends right when you get the final point, closing down instantly without waiting to display the end text.

The writing is minimal, there isn't a strong connecting narrative. The puzzles are logical, though. If this was a trial run for the author to check out the language, it succeeded. I'm very glad there was a tutorial, as most games written in .exe parser are hard to navigate, so that's a definite plus here!