Reviews by MathBrush

I've played this game 3 times since IFComp, each time trying several endings.

It uses Texture, which is a mobile-friendly app which seems like it could work well with screen readers.

Each page, though, is just two choices, which split into 2 choices, about 8 times. Or 6, actually.

The writing is good, but pure branching just isn't my style. I did enjoy it more on my 3rd playthrough, though.

I beta tested this game.

This game is a short surreal story where you wander about an office place that is somewhat fantastical, and is both familiar and not.

It's hard to know what actions will have what effects, but that too is part of the story.

The best part of this game is the unusual culture of it, different from the male-powered white American setting assumed for so many games.

This is actually a pretty good game, but just a bit odd. You are a squid.... sometimes, in a development that reminds me of the old game Delusions, although I'm sure the resemblance is a coincidence.

The game has a nice world model, with different locations and the ability to take and use objects. There are some fun graphics and cool timers and text effects.

It's a bit odd that you have to undo at times to move around the game, and there was an occasional typo (I saw the word maintenance room with two brackets after it), but overall it was a fun game.

This game has an entertaining premise: zombies have attacked Vigamus, the video game museum, and you have to use video game powers to save the museum.

But it falls flat with missing synonyms, sexist humor, and an overly zany plot. Others have definitely enjoyed it (it has some great ratings on textadventures.co.uk) but it didn't suit me personally.

This game shows, like Stone Harbor, the power of a great story mixed with good physical and visual interaction. Both games are strongly linear, with fewer interactions, but with a great effect.

Ash tells the story of the death of the authors mom, a lingering death in the hospital. There are some interesting choices in the story with subtle effects later, but it's mostly linear. The beauty comes from the tight writing, the smooth visual effects, the appropriate font, and the way that the choices seem to reflect thought and intent more than actual decisions. You are choosing how to feel, not what to do. This worked well for me.

I finished both times with goosebumps all over my arm. This game is on the opposite end of the also great Cactus Blue Motel in terms of world model and interactivity, but both are great. Neither game resembles the super-branching wild stories that the lower-placing entries have. I love this game.

I am a fan of poetry, but not generally of procedurally generated poetry, except for the Mary Jane of Tomorrow. This program generates random, disjointed ghazal-form poems based on some input.

I think more could have been, for instance with rhyming procedurally or otherwise using the stricter forms of Ghazal.

I'll admit, I was disappointed, because I thought this game actually had a series of secret coded messages that you had to decrypt, from hints in the text.

But this is actually a bunch die of letters from a girl to the player that talk about life and difficulties. The styling is great, and the game is polished and descriptive. There was some strong profanity.

Really polished, but relatively short and hard to piece together.

I beta tested this game. A single playthrough of this game takes you through a series of battles and explorations in a luxury apartment building after a zombie apocalypse.

The game is not too long, and there are some difficulties with the translation. However, on more playthroughs, it has more features: more branches, randomization, multiple languages.

This game is actually exactly what a great short game looks like about 1/2 to 3/4 of the way through the writing process. There is a good storyline with side bits, the main walkthrough is implemented, there aren't that many bugs, but it isn't really all the way there: there are some descriptions that were written quickly and need revising, many objects are unimplemented, conversations need more topics, and all of the thousand little responses for standard actions and wrong attempts need to be added.

This game is mostly about fixing the curtain so the stage can go up. It does a good job of characterizing the different individuals involved.

This is a very branching game, with, I assume, 10 endings (I've seen 4 or 5).

It has extensive styling of the words and background, which was a little grating but much better than the standard style.

This was a mostly branching game, meaning that most choices end up sending you on different paths. However, a lot of the paths are just quick bad endings, so there is one main correct path.

The story and writing were okay, I would say above average for unedited Internet stories. There was some profanity, but not a lot.

Overall, it could be a fun short sci fi game for a lunch break.