Reviews by MathBrush

This game is centered around a language or collection of languages that the protagonist is trying to study.

The central mechanic is that you are presented with 3-syllable words that you can alter.

The discussion centers on the idea that language influences our thoughts and actions, and vice-versa.

I liked this game, but it didn't draw me in emotionally.

This is a very short little game where you are trying to get your crazy future-telling device to work.

It's a one-room game, but very little is implemented. I had to decompile the game to figure out how to get the device to work. I had further difficulties with basic commands like going in doors.

The idea isn't bad, but it could be better developed.

I beta tested this game.

This is an ambitious concept debuted here in a demo game. It is an rpg game with procedurally generated text and spinning wheels indicating combat.

I liked the system quite a bit; the styling was good, and the graphics nice. I felt a bit dissociated from the story; like real RPGs, the story was in service to the puzzles.

There is hidden material here; despite beta testing and playing again later, I didn't find the sword or defeat the giant monster. Worth checking it out to see the system.

This game is a mid-length Twine game (30,000 words in 214 passages).

It's about a rough, one-eyed monster hunter named Jacobi. He's carrying out various tasks for the king in return for help for his loved one.

The game has you face three challenges, each with a map and combat. They become darker as you progress, with the title referring to thematic darkness.

I actually liked this game's interactivity (moving, fighting, buying and selling), but there were several typos, and I was turned off by the 'grizzled unhappy war hero make dark choices' theme. I like those themes in general, but only lightened by a great deal of heart. This game has some (with Elias and Cassandra), but for my personal tastes, I would have liked more balance. This is definitely a personal thing, and others may wish it even darker.

This is a short Twine game where there are many branches (around 60 endings), but each play through is very short.

There is no distinctive CSS styling, but the game is written in a consistent voice.

I downloaded the file and opened it up in Twinery to see the code, and I think I know what happened with the development of this game. It seems to be a classic case of "What's fun for the author isn't what's fun for the player."

The Twine code is lovingly organized and garnished, with little extras here and there, either private jokes or Easter eggs for code-readers. The code branches all over, and has little Easter egg chunks like a map of the author's house, a little section on self-harm, asides, the chance to fight the narrator, etc.

The problem with this structure is that the player never sees it. As is common in this author-centered style, the cool content is hidden in branches the player is unlikely to take. The most normal branches are the shortest and the most straightforward. An author tends to think, 'Ah-ha! The player will try the first few branches, realize that something is off, and try the elaborate branches!'

But what tends to happen is, the player thinks, 'I've seen a lot of short, under implemented fantasy twine games. I've played through twice, and that's what this seems like, so I'm out of here', never seeing what lies beneath.

Another issue is that, because each play through is so short, most of the work is on content the player will never see. Cat Manning had the same issue with Crossroads in the 2015 IFComp, and later worked to retool her style with Invasion, which had longer playthroughs.

So, this is a lovingly-crafted, well-written game, but if you want to see all of it, you need to put in a lot of work.

I helped beta test this game.

This game meets my niche interests well. It is a combat random combat RPG in a fantasy setting, where it's mostly puzzle-based; most monsters are extremely difficult to defeat until you solve another puzzle, than become generally easy. It allows for some variability, though, as you can sequence break or die in an easy fight due to randomness.

I thought this was fun. A couple of times I felt thwarted by not knowing what to do, though.

I beta tested this game.

This is a story that only branches twice, but does so in an effective way. You are the wife of a puppet master who performs across the country, but you have to make a difficult choice when he turns to dark means to support his work.

It's fairly short, and it uses type-writer effect text on light backgrounds with music/sound effects.

I beta tested this game.

This is a short parser game in the Lovecraftian tradition. It takes place mostly on an airplane.

The game is interesting both story-wise and mechanically. Story-wise, it features a protagonist that isn't just a standard anglo-saxon. Mechanically, it features 3-dimensional movement in multiple environments. 3d movement is something I worked on in my game Ether, and I think this game handled it well.

However, the interactivity was iffy, as it was difficult to know what commands would work.

This game is about a girl named Mikayla, whose phone you find. The game consists of digging though all the apps in the phone to see what her life was like.

I enjoyed the photos (of random things like dogs and writing) and the poetry. There were text notes and voice memos that were, I think, too long for me. They seemed to be there mainly to provide a feeling of reality and background; however, in a storytelling environment, being 'true to life' often makes things too unwieldly. I feel that the purpose of stories is to condense and crystallize reality, and those two parts of the game could have used significant condensing and crystallization.

Overall, it left a good impression on me, especially the ending (which I found by poring through the code).

This short Twine game uses specialized styling to give a retro sci-fi fi feel, and the story fits that vibe as well. You are visiting a base on the moon which has been terrorized by space animals. It borrows heavily from the feel of the Alien movies.

However, it is fairly short, and the writing has a few problems that could be remediated by some more careful revision and beta testing. Overall, though, the basic storyline was interesting.