Reviews by MathBrush

This game has no puzzles whatsoever, which is not necessarily a drawback. Games like Galatea and Aisle have shown that such things can be done effectively.

The game consists of an art gallery where four different characters can view 12 different paintings. Each person has a different take on the painting, and often you can discover the 'true meaning' of a painting from one character and not the other.

The game shows how art is partly the author and partly the viewer, and how the viewer creates art as it observes it. In this respect, it reminds me a lot of "Creatures such as we" by Lynnea Glasser.

I didn't enjoy the genre of the tale, though. It has the breathy, shocking, Schadenfreude feeling that's so popular. Books like the Kite Runner or Mudbound or other books where the characters have horrible or depressing secrets and it all comes together to a kind of gritty 'determination to live despite all' don't entice me. The story did not move me, which I found disappointing, considering that I'm a big fan of Ian Finley's work.

In Earth and Sky, you play as a woman who discovers superpowers, together with her brother.

There are two times where you use your powers: a training session, and a battle. Before each of these events is a short exposition/exploration segment.

The exposition sections use a menu conversation system with the chance to be normal or to use crazy B-movie dialog.

The plot is silly, but the writing is vivid and you can really imagine what is going on. I think the author was very successful here.

I recommend this game, especially because it is so short that you have nothing to lose by playing it.

As soon as I read the premise of Fate, I found it exciting. As you immediately learn, you are a pregnant queen about to give birth; you also have the capacity to see your child's future. Your goal is to change that future.

Gijsbers' game has excellent writing, reminding me of the best parts of Ian Finley's Kaged and Adam Cadre's Varicella. But what I appreciated most was something else; no matter how many IF games I play, I still seem to need walkthroughs for everything. But I didn't have this issue for this game, because:

1. You can always reach some sort of ending in the game, and your endings improve as you go on. So if you can't get more than halfway in the game, you get a halfway-decent ending.

2. Almost all of the puzzles seem to have multiple solutions.

The game has a dark theme, and includes violence. But your character is clearly motivated by a positive goal, and the game rewards you whether you choose violence or not. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that you can reach what I consider the best ending without (Spoiler - click to show)injuring the pixie. However, I didn't find a way to avoid (Spoiler - click to show)killing the gardener; but as I said, the game doesn't force you to do anything you don't want to.

The moral choices seemed a bit easier to me as well, since your character is (Spoiler - click to show)a prisoner, and (Spoiler - click to show)her family is at war with her husband, who stole her away and won't promise to stop her child from being killed.

This is my favorite Eric Eve game. It has all the things he does so well: gripping storyline, interesting but not-too-hard puzzles, incredible help system and 'go to' commands, massive map, huge inventory, and good gameplay flow.

It also has less of my least favorite aspect of his games, a focus on a male protagonist that has his pick of women. The woman definitely has the upper hand in this game.

You play a character in a city that is being evacuated due to a threat by an unknown Enemy. You stay behind to search for a woman you care for. An enormous relationship with this woman unfolds through flashbacks, which you can "REMEMBER" at any time.

I loved this game. Five stars. Some may not like it as much, and it's not in my top ten favorite,but it was a good show.

This game is pretty bizarre. In this game, you are a health inspector checking out a horribly disgusting bar. You get points by 'noting' things in your notebook.

I really enjoyed this part of the game. It's fun trying to think of every way you can get the jerk owner on stuff. Although I should have known weird things were going on when (MAJOR SPOILER)(Spoiler - click to show) I found eyeballs floating in the gutter). I realized that this game may not be for the squeamish; I felt a bit uncomfortable.

After a while, you start to find out weird stuff. I formed an initial theory. After I found the weirdest of the weird stuff, my theory took a blow, and then was shattered into millions of pieces. The final plot of the game was a little cliche, but done inventively enough that I had a great time. At least it wasn't a poorly-done Lovecraftian game (although I have to say, of the seven Lovecraftian games I have played, all were well done).

I needed a couple of hints.

Sometimes I think Emily Short has a competition with herself to see how many different magic systems she can come up with.

In this short game, you can take amounts of time from an object and place them in another object. The game makes this fairly simple.

This is a speed-IF, which generally means messy implementation. That doesn't show up as much here, except for leaving the tower. Also, the ending took me a bit to figure out.

Beyond being just a speed IF, this was a new-language speed IF, which means that Emily Short learned TADS and made this game all in a couple of days. Extremely impressive.

In this game, you slap about 10 fish to death in order to survive and to avenge.

I thought Slap That Fish was boring at first, but by the fourth or fifth fight, the game started getting really fun. It turns out that just slapping is not optimal; it'll get you through the first few fights, but there are other methods that can sometimes even end a fight in one hit.

The later fights require inventive items and difficult items.

I had no shame using the walkthrough when I got stuck on the shark, because the puzzles were a little obscure, and the walkthrough will NOT give you the best score. You have to be creative to get a perfect score.

I managed to get a perfect score on the first 3 fish the second time around, but I don't know how to perfectly defeat the catfish or the tuna.

As others have noted, this game has essentially two parts (not including short, one-shot scenes).

The first part is very enjoyable, more than any Eric Eve game I have played. In its crispness, focus, and detail, and linearity, it reminded me of Dual Transform by Plotkin. You are an adventurer in the snow, trying to helo your civilization.

The second part fell flat for me, especially the ending. It seemed the author left much unfinished. The puzzles were still good; although I missed an inventory item by not reading descriptions.

Overall, I recommend this gamee.

Mrs. Pepper's Nasty Secret is about a woman in your neighborhood who stole your skateboard and is pretty mean.

You investigate her, and discover quite a bit about her past. You meet some interesting NPC's, and have to work out some really very clever puzzles.

The game lasts not very long; it took me 508 moves the first time I played it. It really feels like investigating the home of the antagonist in Wishbringer.

I recommend this game; it is short and entertaining.

This game is a typical Eric Eve game:

Good points of Eve games: several NPC's, large map that doesn't really need mapping, optional side quests, great writing, interesting plot.

This game is a bit like Dante's inferno, but with a more 'modern' take. In particular, there are forces that disbelieve the truth of heaven and hell, and the game doesn't say who's right and who is wrong. As a case in point, one of the first things you see is that hell is closed, due to mythologicalization.

The general gameplay was very enjoyable. It felt like Blue Chairs without the drugs and profanity.

Bad points: trophy-ization of women.

Just like Elysium Enigma with the naked Lena and Blighted Isle with Betty the buxom, All Hope Abandon is chauvinistic. The main woman is referred to frequently as just 'the blonde', and there is a green-skinned demon, who makes you uneasy because they 'use sexuality as a weapon, just like many mortal women'.

It's a shame that these games all pigeonhole women, as otherwise I would strongly recommend them to everyone.