Reviews by Wanderlust

As an elementary birder, this game was an unexpected delight. The writing and presentation is like a virtual tour, so the experience almost felt like going on a birdwalk with the author, who included photos, image descriptions, relevant links, and the thought process behind bird identification. It's edu-tainment, and a nice introduction for anyone who's interested in the hobby. My only suggestion is that it would've been cool to include a link to all the species observed at the end of the game, and to include audio files for the observations that were heard, but not seen.

My favorite part was how well the author captured the peaceful, exploratory nature of birding. The player is invited to meander along whatever paths they choose while life flows around them--- brief interactions with other strangers enjoying their day, passing observations of the people around them. It's a perfectly relaxing Saturday morning out in nature.

Minimalist, well-designed Twine fiction in an evocative science fantasy setting. I enjoyed the cycling choices to emulate spiraling thoughts and the illusion of choice, as if the narrative could have had a different outcome (Despite the title warning us in advance). Although I tend to find flashback sequences jarring, they were incorporated smoothly in this game, and the added context made each iteration of the fight in the cathedral more heartbreaking, exacerbated by the music.

This is, as the chronically online kids say these days, giving doomed yuri. While there's no explicit romantic tension between the two female protagonists in the game, the dynamic is the same, and reminds me of the Richard Siken quote, “Someone has to leave first. This is a very old story. There is no other version of this story.” In this case, who leaves first is a little more ambiguous, but it sets our story to its inevitable conclusion.

Yes, the title of my review is a reference to the Dawn Machine from Sunless Sea, but to be fair, it was hard not to, with the references to clockwork and solar present in the game.

I quite enjoyed it overall. The writing was tight and tension immediate, even before the (Spoiler - click to show)famine began--- the need for control and perfection from an absolute monarch, one who already seemed high strung when all was well. Playing this was what I imagined Caligula was like, and my heart sympathized for the poor subjects of the king of Xanadu.

A fun game to play on lunch break! I liked the punchy (Ha!) sound effects, and even the simple stick figure cover art had its charm. Playing the game was pretty nostalgic for me--- it was reminiscent of those silly stick figure flash games I'd play with my friends.

While a single playthrough can be quite short, the game has high replay value, due to its many branching paths, presented as binary choices, and the ability to navigate forward and backward to explore alternate paths.

It's like an anti-joke. It's a joke entry in this competition. It's a meta commentary on the nature of interactive fiction. Is a refusal to engage, thereby winning the game, still a form of interaction? I appreciated the novelty of it, if nothing else, even if it doesn't make for a very fun game.