Reviews by MathBrush

The early Quest engine had a number of issues, mainly that you had to define each action separately, and it didn't do synonyms well. So much of this game is 'guess the verb'. I downloaded an old version of quest to play it, as gargoyle was having some problems.

You play a woman who becomes a superhero after a mysterious hilt comes into her life. The game goes from scene to scene. I couldn't finish one scene due to a bug (I think I had the wrong interpreter yet again), but opening the quest file in Notepad++ revealed the ending, as the game is completely linear.

In this game, you are in a facility that is wired to blow. Most rooms are empty, except for some with one item. Like Scott Adams, it has a two-word parser.

It was fairly fun, but it could have had a greater depth of implementation, and there was some 'guess the verb' stuff going on later. It also had an annoying maze.

Fun for those looking for a quick snack.

This game has three main puzzles, and is a cinematic game with nice background descriptions.

I struggled a bit with the game, as I didn't speak german. But it is very short, and the medieval background was really fun.

I've provided a small walkthrough:
(Spoiler - click to show)To get over the wall, jump then pull yourself.

For the forest, stick sticks in the ground.

For the man, alternate fighting and talking, with a lot of talking.

This game is just a light puzzle plus a series of locks and keys. The keys are bizarre; a weapon, a jar, they can all be keys.

This just seems quickly programmed in an old an bad language. I wonder if the author wrote it years before and spruced it up for the comp. It does have some nice Ascii art, and some fun ideas, but it needs a lot of work.

This game has you exploring a little abandoned islet. It really reminds me of the little prince with its illustrations, especially a sheep, a snake, a desert, etc.

It has a music-based puzzle (without sound) that was nice. It was all very light, though, and had you take some actions that are rather unguessable. The pictures were pleasant, though.

This is a somewhat kafka-esque game which is translated from spanish. It was later retranslated as 'dead reckoning' (which can be found at the Olvida Mortal page, not the other game also titled Dead Reckoning

You wake from a sort of fugue in a very, very long line. You can't remember why you're there.

The game was essentially fair, and had great atmosphere, but it had one really, really bad 'guess the sentence' puzzle involving the SAY TO WOMAN "something something" type command.

Has some brief strong profanity.

I like the atmosphere in this game. You're in a town on the Gulf Coast, exploring a town and an old wharf.

The game isn't large, so it doesn't take too long to finish. But it could be much better-clued. Without clues, this game is like playing monopoly for the first time without instructions.

There was one action required at the end that I found unusually gruesome, but somewhat logical in hindsight.

This game is the first Quest game ever entered into IFComp.

You wandering in the first to give a flower to a girl. Then more stuff happens. It is really a teenagerish game (male, specifically), from the plotline to the poor spelling and bugginess.

At least the author was bold by going out on a limb, entering the first Quest game ever.

This game uses the Adrift parser, which is inherently problematic.

It is a sequence of small rooms with really unclear puzzles, including a sound puzzle. The puzzles are really irritating.

However, this game did not come last in the competition. It's possible that hardcore puzzle fans may enjoy this game.

In this game, a female college friend gives you (a male) a disk of Advent 550 to help you over the blues.

You end up playing the game, and falling asleep with your friend on the couch. You have a trippy dream involving will crowther.

The Adrift parser isn't that great (I used 3.90), but the game pulled some clever tricks for the game-within-a-game. I actually enjoyed this, but I had to put it in the Adrift Generator to find all the necessary tasks.