Reviews by MathBrush

This game was part of the Single Choice Jam. It features a low stakes card game that suddenly becomes much more dangerous when a stranger walks in.

This is a classic story, and I've seen at least two other takes on the general concept this year. What I like about this one is its nice character development, showcasing well-thought-out people with interesting traits.

It's short and kind of cuts out, a straightforward but well-done implementation of the 'single choice' prompt. Would read more by this author.

This game was entered in the Single Choice jam, but it has some surprising depth.

Visually, it's a stack of cards representing floors of a tower. Every time you go up a floor, a card gets added to the pile. You can hover over older cards to see where you came from, and there's an inventory you can hover over.

There are no actions you can pick except to, whenever you want, fall, an option listed at the top. At one point, you're explicitly forced to choose to fall or not.

You can turn on game hints for the game, which I did out of idle curiosity at one point, but I'm glad I did; the ending was fun, once I realized what had truly happened.

I wavered between 3 stars and 4 and even 5, and settled on the latter, as I liked the originality and the implementation.

My feelings went up and down as I played this Single Choice Jam game.

It looks really nice, with good pictures, transition, etc. I felt like it was setting up a pretty cool scenario.

Then it turns into kind of a tech demo sort of thing; the game has you click at exactly the right time. There's also timed text; I found myself doing other stuff in real life while waiting for the game to finish, until I found I could click through...most of the time. Other times there's more requirements.

To me, the story never really broached established tropes, or really defined what was going on. I don't think it was AI generated, but it had a similar vibe, a cobbling together of pre-existing ideas without specialization into something unique. As a tech demo for the engine it's advertising, though, I think it's successful; it looks easily as powerful as Twine, and works well on mobile. I wonder if it works good for screenreaders, as I've heard complaints about Twine related to that.

This game was entered in the single choice jam.

There is only one choice, of course: make toast, or not?

Each gives you a pretty silly story, each connected to the other. Each is very short. It was pretty funny, but there was at least one typo (windowcill vs windowsill).

This game was entered into the Single Choice Jam.

The concept is that you are invited to a dinner party where you have the choice to win an inimitable item, one that can change your destiny forever.

Your only choice is whether to participate or not. Doing so requires some self reflection.

There are strong scraps of worldbuilding and an interesting thought experiment, although I felt like those two facets didn't mesh very well. The interesting parts of the worldbuilding were the individual human stories and their mundanity, while the 'twist' of the game invites more personal introspection. I'd be interested in seeing some more of the setting/people in another game.

This game is written for the Single Choice Jam.

It depicts a single passage from which many other links branch out, each giving a disjointed dreamlike narrative.

I think the game succeeds admirably in its design, being dreamlike and disconnected. However, that very disconnectedness works against its lasting impact, for me. I almost wish that either things had been more connected (hidden narrative) or much more disconnected.

This game was entered into the Single Choice Jam, and uses the format well, I feel.

It's a beautifully styled short Twine game with one choice at the beginning followed by 'dynamic fiction' (just click to get to the next part).

It talks about a certain kind of trauma, specifically (Spoiler - click to show)secondary traumatic stress. It hit home, for me.

The concept is a big part of different cultures, including mine. In my religion, we believe (Spoiler - click to show)Jesus basically experienced everything in the game, but willingly, as a big sacrifice that was extraordinarily painful(Spoiler - click to show). When it's not so willing or the person doing it not so capable, it can be very painful. Very interesting read.

This game is part of the single-choice jam. It has nice presentation using a very old school Hypercard system (or similar).

You play as a member of a polar tribe in the wake of a nuclear war. Your shaman has died, and you have ritually been chosen to hunt down the murderer.

There are quite a few options at the end, making this basically a murder mystery where you choose the ending.

It is in both French and English, and I played in both. Overall, I liked it. I'm not sure if it was 'authentic' to current native tribes or invented, but the characters were, I believe, well-written and I was invested in the final choice.

This game was made for the Single Choice Jam.

In it, you play as a knight on a chessboard (with a framing story), and have to do a knight's tour. The path is completely predetermined; all possible movements are highlighted but only one is clickable. However, you can choose initially between three such paths.

The paths basically teach you how Knight's tours work. I enjoyed the 'stick to the edges' one best.

This is a Twine game in the Single Choice Jam.

It's based around a single gimmick, where an adult is lecturing you but (full spoilers) (Spoiler - click to show)he gets mad if you click too fast, because you're just rushing, and mad if you click to slow, because you're not paying attention.

To me it feels like a real conversation with an abusive or at least just grumpy/self-involved person, always looking for something to nitpick and always trying to leave you with the feeling that you did something wrong.

The main mechanic did leave me scrambling, and I had to do several retries, so I'm still on the fence on how I feel about it.