Reviews by MathBrush

I just wanted to comment before the main review. I plan on reviewing every single Choicescript game. My 5-point rating system is weighted heavily in favor of these games. Every game I've ever seen from Choice of Games is polished, descriptive, replayable, and has some form of good interactivity.

So I don't anticipate giving any number of stars either than 4 or 5, unless there is something deeply offensive in one of the games.

With that out of the way, this game is fairy hefty in length and in content. You play as a young werewolf in a world where werewolves have been hunted almost extinction and forced into an internment camp on the east coast of the US.

Unlike most works that deal with 'other-humans' that are persecuted, like X-Men, the werewolves in this game don't seem to be a code for human ethnicities or sexualities.

Instead, at least in my violence-and-fury centered playthrough, it seems to be an honest attempt to see what it would be like to be a predator, thought sentient. My hypothesis is bolsetered by the large number of friends and others I see online who discuss and write about being sentient animals. The story deals with bloodlust, and in no way does it punish you for violence and murder, treating it as natural for wolves.

There are several romantic options, and quite a few opportunities to act on them.

The worldbuilding is the main focus here. There is an elaborate back story, characters with huge histories (there's got to be a spreadsheet or book of lore kept by the author somewhere), detailed topography (that book/spreadsheet has to have a map attached).

The plot is designed to get you through this worldbuilding and the main plot points. Others online commented that they felt railroaded in this game, and I can see where they're coming from. But I enjoyed the setting and the characters, especially the storyline around the main rival.

I received a review copy of this game.

This game is an ancient relic discovered and remade by Ryan Veeder, who has found all the documentation relating to it. By pure luck, the style of the gameplay has the whimsical charm and quality implementation characteristic of Ryan's own writing style (probably why he was attracted to it in the first place).

This game has a fairly hefty map, with a city of about 12 locations, many with an interior, and another chunk from extra side rooms and a couple of (not at all bad) maze-like locations. (maybe maze-lite locations).

The game has a built-in hint system where you ask your friends for help (which I accessed many times), and Dan Fabulich has made comprehensive invisiclues.

The story is basically what you would get if you had the Hobbit, but instead of the background of the Silmarillion you had a custom story that was a mashup of Captain Planet, Gargoyles and TMNT, and instead of Bilbo wandering around the very edges of the backstory you had a girl wandering around doing random stuff.

And the main theme of the game is (Spoiler - click to show)trading. If you every played the original game boy Zelda game, there was a long, involved trading quest involving everyone. That's basically what's going on here. You wander around town, slowly realizing what everyone wants or needs. Then all at once you find the starting point and it falls like dominoes. Until you get stuck.

The 17 digit key wasn't as hard as I expected it to be, but was computationally satisfying, especially the dichotomy chart, which reminded me of the tree dichotomy chart in the kids' encylopedia I had growing up, where if you identify the tree wrong, you get devoured by monsters on the next page.

I enjoyed the game, and also when I saw the Help text, I felt overcome and rested my head on the table in gratitude. I had fun with this game.

This game has you working in a call center with 99 calls to finish. There are only a few options, including going to a cafeteria or looking out the window, before you go back to the main loop.

It uses video a lot; it seems to be autoplaying youtube videos that are so enlarged the youtube gui is off the screen (only autoplaying after you click a link, since Chrome disabled regular video autoplay, I think).

It's very abstract, and the game slowly changes. I played before looking at other reviews, but later sought ought more in case I was missing something big. I thought this game reminded me of Degeneracy (a parser implementation of the same concept), and I saw that Emily Short said the same thing years ago.

I rate games on a five point scale.

+Polish: A lot of effort went into this, and it was smooth.
+Descriptiveness: The sounds, videos, and text made the message clear.
-Interactivity: I was left wondering if I was missing something, and so it didn't work well for me.
-Emotional impact: I bounced off the high level of abstraction.
+Would I play again? I might; it was interesting, and I would try different paths.

Now that I've played several of the very early Choicescript games, I can see a bit more of a pattern. They are all very adventurous, leaning heavily into the TTRPG/gamebook style of one encounter after another. They tend to have the narrator comment on your actions, are quite a bit shorter than later choicescript games.

That can work well; I really enjoy the fast-paced dramatic action in Choice of the Dragon, and the first third of Choice of Romance (which was the only part initially available) is likewise a quick fun play.

This game didn't do it as much for me. But I've never really liked seafaring stories, besides Moby Dick (which was more of a whale encylopedia, which I am into). For some into Horatio Hornblower or the like, I think this would be amazing.

It has a fairly satisfying rival set up, providing the best moments of the game, and lot of action. There are 3 romances (you can't romance your rival, but there is quite a bit of underlying tension there).

Again, this is a great game, but it pales (to me) in comparison to some of the other great Choicescript games out there, many of them inspired by this one. It's kind of like Ditch Day Drifter, a game which kicked off the whole TADS movement but which was surpassed by its followups.

This game is also notable for letting you genderswap the entire world, making women the fierce and soldiery types of the world and men the gentle beaus at the ball.

I received a review copy of this game.

This game is pretty different from other Choice of Games titles. Its core gameplay is driven by a series of monthly budget meetings, interspersed with an ongoing mystery/action plotline.

You play as the new CEO of of Metahuman Inc., being forced into the position after the disappearance of the previous owner. Metahuman Inc. secretly uses both magic and extraterrestrial technology to modify humans. Unfortunately, for legal reasons, they've lost all their previous tech an rely on you to decide what to purchase next.

The core budget cycle is complex. You can invest your funds into different stock portfolios, or develop new personal enhancements (your main source of income), or invest in research to make future products better.

The 'action' portions revolve around the missing CEO, and include opportunities for romance (I found the romance plotline I chose satisfying). The two intermingle as your business decisions impact your personal life, and your personal goals require you to divert business resources.

The first scene was a bit odd for me, as the game labelled me as duplicitous when I didn't feel I behaved that way, but then it took off into a satisfying sci-fi story. I got a lot of satisfaction out of this game, found the characters memorable, and enjoyed the storyline. Many COG titles feel rushed at the end, as (from my own experience writing them) you have to write so many endings that each one can get a bit diluted. That wasn't the case with metahuman.

I received a review copy of this game.

Edit: I realize now that this game reminds me of Actraiser, which had a sim-portion and a fighting-portion, and that was one of my favorite games growing up. This game definitely ranks in the top third of Choicescript games I've played.

Choice of Ninja was the 13th or so Choicescript game put out, and I found it one of the weakest games at first, but it grew on me as I played.

I happened to play this as I was watching Naruto Shippuden for the first time, and the parallels are easily visible. You play a young orphan raised in a village in the woods, and it starts with you having to pass a test at your school to become a full ninja. There is magic, most of which involves invisibility, but becoming a duplicate is another skill. There are other parallels, like escorting a crotchety old man and dealing with a friend on the dark side.

But in a lot of ways its more realistic. Evil monsters are hinted at but not shown. There's no real magic past stealth magic and duplicate magic. So the over-the-top magical fantasy of stories like Naruto are toned down, and the parallels become less and less as you play.

The last half of the game is where I feel like it came into its own. Other reviewers have said that this game is very linear, and choices don't matter, but I felt like my choices mattered quite a bit when it came to the plans on infiltrating the final fortress. It was fun.

That said, I don't think this one holds up as well as other older Choicescript games, especially when compared to Slammed!, which came out around the same time. Slammed! is in the top 5% of all IF games ever, to me, with a story that has you hooked from the beginning and gut wrenching decisions at the end.

So, as an overall IF game, compared to most games in IFDB, Choice of the Ninja is high quality and worth playing, but compared to other commercial Choice of Games stories, I don't recommend it unless you're playing through them all.

This game has quite a bit of history behind it. It was the fourth Choice of Games title, when they were all named 'Choice of' (the ones before it being the Dragon, Broadsides, and the Vampire). A year later, it received an update with an entire new chapter, and then another update.

It's power fantasy in its purest form. You are young and gorgeous and everyone wants you, including the king/queen. You can choose everyone's gender in the game and due to magic any two people can have a baby. Tension in the kingdom is preserved, though, by replacing gender with magic. The type of magic you are born with determines who can rule.

Every choice you make has massive consequences. You are constantly romancing someone or making backroom deals or starting a war or revolutionizing the system or jousting in a tournament. I found it very similar to Sims in the way you can meddle with everything and everyone.

Being so early in the history of the company, it has a lot of odd quirks. It has three major paths you can choose, but only one leads to the updated content, the others ending with your old age and death after seeing only a third of the content. There is a lot of customization of your appearance that ends up not mattering. Some of your bases stats are rarely checked. There are a lot of binary choices, and there are several 'huge list' choices where you have 7 or more choices. The narrator comments on your choices to you directly, something I only remember seeing in Choice of the Dragon.

The game is full of the eponymous affairs. I do not support affairs in real life, but this is a fantasy, and more than that, it's a fantasy that shows the real-life problems, jealousies, and conflicts that are the natural consequences of affairs. I think it's worthwhile to play and fun, to boot.

As I've been playing through Choice of Games stories, I've found ones that are touching, majestic, goofy, weird, and high-quality.

This one is just plain fun. It's a James Bond-type thriller, and it does interactivity right. I was able to really customize the kind of person I wanted to be, pursue the relationships I wanted to pursue, and have moments where I really felt torn between two goals but knew what I had to do.

The game revolves around investigation of a tech firm that has experienced recent layoffs and a suspicious employee death. There is a lot of worldbuilding, but in a mostly easy-to-understand way, like the enemy agency DIABLO which uses codenames based on devils.

I found this easy to play, engaging, and long enough that I felt satisfied. If Choicescript games were food, this would be meat and potatoes (if you're into that thing). Simple and especially, especially when done right.

Content-wise it's very similar to Bond films. There was one instance I found of strong profanity, some heavier violence towards the end (including alluded torture and some gore depending on your choices). My playthrough had heavy flirting but no explicit sexuality, but the game lets you customize this quite a bit so I'm not sure about other paths.

Would definitely recommend.

I received a review copy of this game.

This is the third Choicescript heist game I've played in the last week (the other two being The Martian Job and The Treasure Seekers of Lady Luck), so I can't help but compare them.

The Martian Job had the most memorable writing and setting of the bunch, with more emotional choices, while Lady Luck had more memorable characters and a zany atmosphere.

This game was just pure heist. You learn about the heist, you recruit your crew, you conduct the heist, you leave. There are a few twists, but they are mostly telegraphed, making them pleasant but not anxiety-inducing.

I'm a big fan of mysteries and crime, so I enjoyed this game, and found it polished. Most of the choices made sense, with a recurring choice of 'Sneaky, Brutal or Flashy' showing up, despite not mapping directly onto the choices. I think this helped in characterization.

I guess I didn't really connect with this game emotionally. My enjoyment was at arm's length. I am interested in playing it again, though, to get some of the more unusual acheivments.

Rarely has a game given me more to think about. For the first time I can remember, I had to keep open a notebook on my thoughts for this review as I was writing, because there was so much I wanted to comment on.

This game felt surreal to me. Caleb Wilson is well-known for his haunting or magical games like Lime Ergot and Starry Seeksorrow. I was definitely looking forward to playing this, and it was one of the games IFDB had most suggested to me over the last few years.

The dreamlike quality pervades this piece. The other works of film or literature I compared it to as I played were Pilgrim's Progress, Dante's Inferno, the film The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, Amadeus, and the works of Baz Luhrmann. If it were produced as a film I'd expect it to look like The Cabinet of Dr. Calegari, and I wonder if the whole Choicescript game couldn't be reinterpreted as a mental exploration of the subconscious. A major feature of the game is numerous bright stages where you sit alone before a dark and murmuring audience in a towering theatre which features bizarre architecture.

As to the game itself, you are a famed composer and musician. This world is an alternate version of Europe, set after the exile of its version of Napoleon and on the eve of a war between Napoleon and Russia.

In this world, many people are possessed with a parasitic intelligence known as a Genius, which may or may not just be a feature of their subconscious. Your genius has various opposed qualities it can lean towards.

Each chapter is played in a different town, each of which is characterized by an abundance of one thing (and here I think of the works of Kafka [but more cheerful] and Michael Ende, although neither one exactly applies).

There are a cast of distinct characters who shadow you everywhere you go, including a rival, a journalist, several love interests, and quite a few spies.

The text of the game is so interesting. I have a whole file of the most dreamlike and surreal bits, but here is a taste:

(Spoiler - click to show)"You approach a glowing rectangle: the strangely small doorway that must open onto the concert stage. Perhaps it is just the peculiar atmosphere of the castle, but you feel oddly nervous. The room is awash in bright light and for a moment you can't see a thing. When your eyes adjust you find yourself standing at the back of the curiously small stage. The hall stretches away farther than the stage lights allow you to see. There is no applause to greet your appearance: half of the audience is staring at you in silence, while the others—clerks, to judge by appearance—are hard at work, pens scratching at ledgers. It seems that for much of the audience, this is a working lunch. There is a blurry square, lit by dim lights, to the side and high up the wall, which is concave like the inside of a spoon. King Ferenc's box, perhaps?"

and another one:

"An elegant woman dressed in black and purple is standing before a marble mantel. There is no fire, just a hint of ashes; instead she—"May I present," says Peruz, "Countess Zerov, an esteemed visitor from the court of Sclavia!"—is the flame. A dark and liquid flame, like that which smolders unseen, sending up barely a hint of smoke and devouring a building from within."

Why, then, would I give 4 stars to a game that affected me so dramatically instead of 5?

I had some troubles. The enormous multitude of names was overwhelming, and I found the game had no almanac or list of names of places and people. Some kind of accompaniment to remind us might be nice.

I had difficulty knowing when my genius was being changed and when it was being tested. I had spent a great deal of time cultivating a mathematical genius, but then realized I couldn't change it more. A chapter or two later, it had suddenly reversed itself to be as unmathematical as possible. One of my choices must have changed it, but when, and where? Many other challenges were similarly opaque.

Overall, this game is a masterpiece of writing and setting, and I feel it will linger in my mind for many years to come. I had a long, long dream last night and this morning, and when I woke up there was a short time where the dream world felt more real than this one. This game parallels that same feeling, and it was surreal and haunting to play it so soon after that experience.

I received a review copy of this game.