Reviews by MathBrush

Visually, this game is a treat. It does for a parser game what has been increasingly common for high-end Twine games over the last few years: custom fonts, background images, special styling (here marginal notes). I love it, and, having tried for a long time to style my Quixe games, I know how hard it can be.

Gameplay-wise, this is polished for an Ectocomp game. You have a ghost that randomly curses things, and a big recipe sheet that tells you how to cook things.

I didn't do too hot, getting 42 on my first attempt and then (undoing for more chances but messing up) getting a 0.

This is the kind of thing I really like to see in Ectocomp: an experiment that stretches the boundaries of IF in interesting ways.

In this game, you play a Japanese ghost who frightens people by removing its face. There is an expansive map with different locations to visit and numerous NPCs.

What is clever here (and which I like) is that you have a to-do list you can visit at any time that tells you what your next steps are (without telling you how to accomplish them) and gives hints of what else lies in the game (with obfuscated 'Bonus' achievements).

It also includes a text-entry puzzle, which seems to be case-dependent (since an answer I tried with lowercase turned out to be the right answer when written in uppercase). The game does provide progressive hints, though.

I think the concepts in this game are interesting and worth trying out in a larger Twine game.

My reaction to this game was "Wow!" followed by frustrated noises followed by "Ewwww".

This is a speed-IF, so programming and grammar bugs are here, but I was so impressed with the vivid writing and setting as the game began. A mysterious ragman comes into your house and gives you 5 heartbeats (or game moves) to give him what he wants.

But it doesn't tell you what he wants. I spent a long time guessing many different things, and I was frustrated.

The solution was, frankly, gross. Not that I think (Spoiler - click to show)breastfeeding is gross, but the fact that (Spoiler - click to show)the monster would desire it. It's written fairly similar to rape, in the sense that a man is demanding use of a woman's organs.

I think this story (and the generally similar piece The Curious Incident at Blackrock Township) shows Bitter Karella's range. Most Karella games are light-hearted dark humor Quest games with characters that are exaggerated, sometimes even caricatures.

This Twine game goes to the opposite end: it uses stately language, academic and poetic, and is built around mimesis. The game is framed as a translation of a German poem, with academic footnotes attached. (Spoiler - click to show)I was unable to find any of the references in real life (i.e. outside of the game). But it was so convincing that I felt I had to find something on some of them. The 'translated folk poetry' bit was really convincing, too. Overall, it gave me a better idea of Karella's range.

The academic process of hunting through footnotes is close to lawnmowering, but I found that it really helped the main idea of the game ((Spoiler - click to show)presenting the narrative as real).

As for the content of the poem itself, I found it really well-done. It reminded me of Gawain and the Green Knight or Der Freischutz.

This parser game is surprisingly well-done for an author's first game. It's basically an implementation of a world based on the song "When He Died" by Neil Cicierega. You are a forensic photographer, and the gameplay is actually very similar to Hanon Ondricek's underrated game Transparent, where you take photos of supernatural events in a mansion.

Here is my ratings scale, one star per category:

Polish: This is the star I'm not giving. There are some issues, like repeating the description of the staircase in the first room, and it could overall use some more beta testing to find synonyms and things to implement. Overall, though, the implementation of a camera is impressive, and the game handles several complex commands and interactions in a smooth manner.

Descriptiveness: This is lovely. Many of the good ideas are taken directly from the song, but I've learned from experience that turning good material into a good game is not trivial. Nice background for the PC.

Interactivity: I turned to the hints once, but otherwise I was pleased with my agency in this game and felt like my actions mattered.

Emotional Impact: Again, the best parts come from the song, but they hit home for me. Had a lot of fun here.

Would I play again?: I'd be interested in revisiting this in the future.

If this is the author's first game, I can only imagine what a longer, heavily-beta tested IFComp game might be like. Very good!

This game consists of a randomized layout of areas, each containing random pieces of decor, some of which benefits you, and randomized deadly encounters.

As a straight-up game, it has flaws. The text has many grammatical errors, the scenery can become repetitive, and it's hard to know how to strategize.

But an an experiment, I like it. Like many people, I've thought of writing a randomized game, but I've never really gotten around to it. This game shows how it could be done, and I think it would be worthwhile to tinker with the code here. I appreciate the author letting us see the code!

Katie Benson has a specific style to her games. They are always kind of low-key and chill, focused on a specific aspect of life, with a 'main' path and one or more side paths, and a lot of little exploration choices in the middle for flavor.

I'm always happy to see one, and I find it pleasant. This one isn't quite as developed as her others, but still gives the same enjoyable vibe. 'Flygskam' (or shame of flying) refers to the movement that tries to avoid the use of airplanes to avoid pollution and energy wastage.

This game adds a new feature where at times you restart the whole game. It would have been tedious, but the game is short enough that clicking quickly takes care of it.

This game attempts to pull off something big: to take an extremely serious topic (pedophilia) and to say something deep about it.

This is hard. People that try to deal with heavy topics often veer into extreme heavyhandedness ("Do you suppress freedom, or give people liberty?") or into almost celebrating the issue at hand (as sometimes happens with self-harm).

This game manages to have strong writing and good pacing. While pedophilia is constantly portrayed as bad (good!) It doesn't make it super clear how we're supposed to feel and act when someone we once knew is accused. The choice here isn't between 'support pedophilia or not', it's between 'seeking punishment vs seeking truth', and 'retreating within oneself vs exposing yourself to harm).

Still, it can get very heavy, but the music is a definite bonus here. There is a credits section, and I tried watching it a few times (it slowly fades in), but I kept missing the music section, so I don't know who did it.

There's a lot of slow text here but it's manageable. Give yourself a good 30-40 minutes to play it, though.

I'm not planning on playing again. The game is good, but it's not enjoyable in the literal sense.

This game is fantasy game where you, Lord of a torture dungeon that is not serving its original purpose, must go on a quest to unsee terrible things.

There are many branches, and many variables. Instead of the game tracking the variables, you need to write down on a personal Adventure Sheet. It's possible to cheat, but the game does a good job of checking!

This is a funny game. It has some raunchy humor, but more in a 'nudge nudge wink wink' way than anything explicit. I found it enjoyable, if a bit silly and short.

This game is strongly D&D-inspired (possibly through intermediate inspirations like Diablo or CRPGs).

You're in a party with a mage, a barbarian, a cleric and a thief. You're plundering a tomb, and you have to choose which of three paths to take. Taking them in the right order with the right strategy can grant you success!

The formatting could use work. All the paragraphs run together, and they need more line breaks (I think you can do that in Twine by adding a completely blank line between paragraphs).

The only woman in the party exists only to be an object of affection, which is disappointing.

This game isn't really trying to push any boundaries or grow beyond its sources, but it it has many of the essentials of a good D&D adventure.