Ratings and Reviews by JJ McC

Adapted from an IFCOMP23 Review

Not ONLY is this part 4 of the “Here There Be Poopdecks” (nautical) review sub-series, it is ALSO part 3 of the “Playing With Matches” (Texture) sub-series! My opinion on Texture is well documented by now: lots of possibilities in drag and drop UI, deep presentation challenges, keep it on a super short leash.

All Hands took a very different approach to Texture. Rather than try to integrate the UI into its story, it instead pressed it into service as a lightweight choice-select mechanism. Effectively, the player is given three tools to interact with every page of text: REFLECT (think about, remember or examine); APPROACH (move around, probably to new page); TAKE (sieze, but also ‘internalize abstract concepts’ especially songs). It becomes an action menu of sorts, all options present until the end, even when a particular page has no response for them. Selecting an option shows any number of words to pair it with. The most effective strategy is to exhaustively explore them all, as unconnected commands could limit options toward endgame.

I respect the chutzpah of bending this VERY singular UI to new purpose, but it is hard to escape that it is a hack. The mechanics are clumsier than choice-select implementations, and the connection balloons read awkward and superfluous almost all the time. Even without balloons, forcing interactions to one of those three verbs results in some notably clunky leaps in phrasing.

So the interface was not fully successful but interesting as an attempt to grapple with the platform. My old nemeses Dancing Font and Hunting Text were left mostly unattended. Hunting Text at least was managed better than most through careful wordsmithing - while still an intrusive exercise at least text made sense before and after revelation which is not always a given for this engine. Dancing Font though, ran WILD. In many places there were plentiful connections for all three commands. Because the author eschewed new pages even when adding very wordy revelations, ALL the text ended up on the page. As selections were made, font size went from “Grandma’s Sudoku” to “Microfiche” appallingly often. Have I mentioned this is a TERRIBLE reading experience? Just awful.

Now, all this presentation cruft is employed in service of a story - a man’s dreamy interaction with a sinister ghost ship. That story itself has Gothic and Lovecraftian overtones. Our protagonist feels pulled by forces stronger than himself, but still retains some degree of autonomy. It is an interesting dance that the author pulls off very well through excellent mood and tone building. Gameplay choices that might feel chafing and railroading elsewhere, here are nicely integrated into the dreamy vibe of the narrative.

The story also neatly balances detailed background (with successful investigation) and unknowably alien horror. The details of the setting are wonderfully bizarre and off-putting, and build through its runtime. Often in horror, when a monster’s background is revealed it has a deflating effect. The specifics of backstory are almost never as compelling as a dark mystery our imagination probes but cannot resolve. The author here does something extremely effective: provides specific details that are WOEFULLY INCOMPLETE. We understand some aspects of the proceedings, but only some. The rest remains in shadow, if not compounded by other dissonant details. The horrible unknowability is maintained to the end! Effective!

There are multiple endings achievable, at least six by my count. Unfortunately, most of these endings require renavigating the full story for a final choice. I replayed to find four of them, but as interesting as the story was, it was not up to the stress of full repetition, including the clumsy UI and the chaos twins Dancing Font and Hunting Text. The four I found were legit horror short story climaxes: reasonably resolving the buildup, and different enough to justify their inclusion. As I contemplated firing up for a fifth run, I couldn’t help conclude this Sparky story would have been much better served by say Twine or ChoiceScript. Something much less Intrusive.

Played: 10/8/23
Playtime: 40min, 4/6? endings
Artistic/Technical ratings:Sparks of Joy in the effective story, Notably Intrusive unmitigated Texture artifacts
Would Play After Comp?: No, experience feels complete. I would be open to a reimplementation in a different engine!

Artistic scale: Bouncy, Mechanical, Sparks of Joy, Engaging, Transcendent
Technical scale: Unplayable, Intrusive, Notable (Bugginess), Mostly Seamless, Seamless

Adapted from an IFCOMP23 Review

The second of the review Subseries, “Playing With Matches,” covering IFCOMP23 Texture entries! I went into depth on Texture as an authoring platform here. A quick summary: lots of possibilities in drag and drop UI, deep presentation challenges, keep it on a super short leash.

Lonehouse is a short study about loss, not just of an important person in your life, but of the possibility of ever re-closing an emotional distance. The player is inhabiting a surviving sibling, going through her somewhat estranged sister’s things. Texture is a good choice here, almost tailor-made, as the entire thing is about connecting thoughts with artifacts.

For most of the runtime, I found the implementation uneven. In particular, the connection balloons - text that appeared as you were about to do the drop of drag’n’drop – often asked yearning questions about the thought being connected. (Spoiler - click to show) Connecting THINK to PLUSHIE: “How long have you kept him for, liv?” Sadly, they just as often did not. On the same page as the above, connecting THINK and CHILDHOOD simply read “think childhood.” More than just a missed opportunity, the contrast felt mocking, belittling, and cast a pall on the revealed text. Some pages managed the crime-against-nature font resize well with short, punchy text and page breaks. Others jumped two or three sizes with multiple selects, further adding insult by exposing text ordering problems that broke the flow. For example, text about a door decoration:

“The other had a strikingly red knitted organizer, filled knick-knacks and keys hanging over the knob. You know this thing. You’ve made it yourself.”

If you examine the other door, the injected response (in bold below) mangles the text around it, sapping the integrity of the page:

“The other had a strikingly red knitted organizer, filled knick-knacks and keys hanging over the knob. A plain white door. You can only assume it’s the bedroom. You know this thing. You’ve made it yourself.”

It’s a shame Texture was allowed to run unfettered, because there are some very affecting passages, including a nicely metaphorical stuffed animal that does double duty as subtle possible explanations for the initial distancing while also providing hints of path forward.

There are other technical glitches though: options remain on screen when no further use is possible. In one spot the choices MOVE and INSPECT are available, but INSPECT does nothing and MOVE provides text (para) “no need to move, lets inspect this thing” The tool allows out of order connections, but the narrative does not accommodate them - sometimes you get word salad, other times you advance without seeing key details. Cumulatively, despite flairs of leveraging the Texture platform, I was prepared to write this off as another narrative undone by inexpert use of a super sharp two edged sword. Until I came to the (Spoiler - click to show)Journal page.

I’m going to try this with minimal spoilers, but its gonna be tough. I found (Spoiler - click to show)opening the journal to be about the most powerful use of Texture I have yet seen. Seriously, it might as well be the Platonic Ideal Texture implementation. You are connecting with obscured passages, and each time, the connection bubble changes your understanding slightly, then the new text powerfully replaces one character’s words with another’s thoughts. You experience things through the filter of yearning questions rather than declarative narration. AND THEN CAPPED BY A FINAL HEARTBREAKING CONNECTION BUBBLE. (And not for nothing, the page size is rigidly engineered to avoid font changes, at least until the end.)

This is the reviewer’s lament. I am trying to recall an exceedingly powerful moment to an audience that may have played it while also trying to entice without spoiler an audience that hasn’t even played it yet. I THINK if you play it, you will know it when it hits you. It sure hit me. If you haven’t played maybe just take my word that embedded in this flawed experience is a deeply affecting sequence.

I have to call it Sparky even before that moment, as the work was decidedly if unevenly leveraging Texture’s unique powers. It didn’t completely escape Notably Intrusive thanks to those jerks Text Hunting and Font Dancing. But that one moment was a white hot spark of “THIS. THIS is how they should teach it in Texture School.”

Played: 10/8/23
Playtime: 20min, two playthroughs
Artistic/Technical ratings: Sparks of Joy, Notably Intrusive lack of constraints on Texture
Would Play After Comp?: No, experience seems complete

Artistic scale: Bouncy, Mechanical, Sparks of Joy, Engaging, Transcendent
Technical scale: Unplayable, Intrusive, Notable (Bugginess), Mostly Seamless, Seamless

Adapted from an IFCOMP23 Review

I do love me some Adventure Snack. A “slice of life comedy” seems in the brand’s wheelhouse, particularly given the pregnant-with-possibility title of the thing. I found it long on slice of life and short on comedy, though I don’t mean that as a dig. Yes, I had expectations coming in based on some truly funny prior games, but the game’s graphic presentation is assured, quickly establishing its own vibe and rhythm. There is no misdirection in title. You are in a Zoom call (sorry, Swoon), fixing your Cartoon Mom’s printer.

If I try to look at it dispassionately and objectively, it is a weird beast. Lots of time spent on the minutiae of printer debug. Lots of family story digressions (including the repetition of family chestnuts!) that are traditionally more entertaining to family members than strangers like me. Some family drama, some advice, questionable hobbies, an intrusive cartoon dog, it all adds up to a surprisingly long runtime, low on out loud laughs.

What it has going for it though is exactingly tight timing and near-supernatural verisimilitude. The printer debug steps (including the missteps!) are exactly correct, as my extensive family tech support experience attests. Cartoon Mom’s tolerance for confusing technical exercise is laughably, relatably short, leading to wild, random topic changes and stories. That are ALSO paced quite well, sometimes needing player intervention sometimes not to get back on task. The whole thing, even the attendant mild impatience with slow progress and digressions, just FELT real. This was a laser-precise, loving simulation of its title.

Maybe let me underline that. This game builds a mood of exasperated impatience, coupled with fond forbearance. ON PURPOSE. Have you ever been impatient with a loved one? Of course you have! Swooning romance, intellectual puzzles, physical thrills, dread and horror, grief and regret. IF trucks in these things ALL THE TIME. “Pssh, low hanging fruit,” sez FYMP. “Let me offer you a tightly curated mix of frustration and good will. How’s THAT taste?” Honestly? Pretty great!

This is how well-constructed it was. I restarted the game, determined to “ok this time I’m gonna be a jerk and see if that unlocks Adventure Snack Comedy ™.” AND I COULDN’T DO IT. I couldn’t be a jerk to my Cartoon Mom. The atmosphere felt real enough that even second time through, the idea of getting selfish and snippy with Cartoon Mom was unthinkable. Yeah I was modestly jerky, but when it came time to commit to full on garbage-child mode I balked. Cartoon Mom didn’t deserve that!

I’m usually only half Engaged when providing real life tech support, so topping out at Sparks of Joy seems perfect. Seamless and attractive implementation. Bonus point for cutting new ground and just nailing its conceit in a stunningly accurate, pitch perfect simulation. Adventure Snack - not just comedy anymore! (Though I do miss that just a little.)

Played: 10/8/23
Playtime: 45min, two playthroughs
Artistic/Technical ratings: Sparks of Joy, Seamless, bonus point for uncanny accuracy
Would Play After Comp?: I promise, I’ll call next Sunday! (but I probably won’t)


Artistic scale: Bouncy, Mechanical, Sparks of Joy, Engaging, Transcendent
Technical scale: Unplayable, Intrusive, Notable (Bugginess), Mostly Seamless, Seamless

Adapted from an IFCOMP23 Review

Part 3 of the “Here There Be Poopdecks” sub-series, this one on a spaceship. This is a light ‘escape the doomed ship on a timer’ joint. The playful tone of the thing is its dominant feature, and who doesn’t like that? From object descriptions, to the increasingly sassy emergency voice, to the voluminous easter eggs you are encouraged to meet the game on its own feather-light terms. Even the puzzle play is pretty unadorned, ‘get X, goto room Y, use X.’ This is not a terrible choice, it ensures the focus is on the playful miscellany, not just the [orchestral sting]MAIN PLOT[/orchestral sting].

A game with the lightness of a feather its going to succeed on how well it can tickle you. Don’t pretend you don’t see what I did there, I know you saw it. And boy did I try to meet the game on its own terms. I tried all the things, I snarked back to the overhead voice, I did Star Trek stuff in rooms that begged it. I also solved the main puzzle and speed ran it. I read the accompanying feelie (which, awesome production value) and tried a lot of the recommended things.

I really went above and beyond to embrace the work’s spirit, if I say so myself. And I came away thinking ‘Maybe this is TOO light?’ It doesn’t help that there are some common implementation issues - unimplemented nouns, overtight verb space, at one point asking for disambiguation between ‘south’ and starboard’? Recommended Easter egg commands that didn’t work ((Spoiler - click to show)>TAP ON GLASS), though later did without clear reason why. A dumbwaiter that was clumsy to navigate. To the game’s credit the light tone did a lot to minimize the impact of these artifacts.

I think where I most wanted more was the Easter eggs themselves. You can do a wide variety of silly things as you amble your way to rescue, but the most common response to doing them is “Yup, you’ve done it!” Ok, but maybe goof with me a little about it? Like, even the most tepid attempt at joke would work, I’m not holding a high bar here, just something more than 'Dunnit!" In the end, I felt like I was doing more work than the game to keep things fun and that kinda lost me.

I will say, there was a vertiginous moment when I thought the game was talking to me directly. (Spoiler - click to show)Jumping into space unprepared led to a death message: “You’ve been sucked out into space. This does not spark joy.” For a mad moment I thought it was talking directly to me and my scoring criteria. That’s how big MY ego is. It was clearly referencing Marie Kondo though, another deflation for me.

Sparks of Joy (MINE, not Kondo’s) and Notable Intrusiveness in implementation, and yearning for just a little more playfulness to realize its goals. That’s where we land. I did get a soft chuckle at “USS Icarus.” I mean, second only to “New, More Unsinkable Titanic” in hubristic boat names.

Played: 10/8/23
Playtime: 1hr, escaped once, died once, stranded twice
Artistic/Technical ratings: Sparks of Joy, Notably Intrusive
Would Play After Comp?: No, experience seems complete


Artistic scale: Bouncy, Mechanical, Sparks of Joy, Engaging, Transcendent
Technical scale: Unplayable, Intrusive, Notable (Bugginess), Mostly Seamless, Seamless

Adapted from an IFCOMP23 Review

Alright, with a game name trading on Inception you are inevitably going to bring some baggage to this one. Early on there is imagery that invokes Squid Game as well, so you’ve got a heady mix of influences informing your expectations regardless of gameplay. Given the inspiration source material, you might expect some significant spoiler risk in a review, and boy would you be right about that. I’m going to endeavor to minimize or shade that as much as I can but with a game whose conceit is SO central I don’t know how that’s going to play out. Let’s find out!

Its starts out with the protag and major NPC introduction. They are fairly blank slate, but I did find the history of their friendship nicely and economically observed as they transitioned from (probably one-sided) rivals to fast friends. The game is not a character study, and barring a limited aspect or two the characters are not that specific or intriguing. The game doesn’t need them to be, that’s not what its after. Which made this intro stand out a bit in a pleasant way.

From there, we cycle to the main event: a mysterious competitive game, driven as most atrocities are by capitalism. I’m kidding, autocracy is equally capable of atrocities. Uh, digression there.

The run up to the game is similarly invested with unnecessary but nice touches. I particularly liked a bus ride that started as “c’mon, there is no way that’s how the fellow commuters behave” and quickly shifted to “Lol, ok game, well played, you got me there!” It did it once or twice more, in one instance leveraging what seems a misguided interface decision into a nice bit of meta playfulness.

In isolation, you might think of those as Sparks, and in isolation you’d be right. Unfortunately, this game creates a HUGE burden for itself that it never quite escapes. Thanks to the prominent metagame context, you the player are SO far ahead of the characters in terms of what’s really going on that it borders on ridiculous. Not that in ‘Real Life’ would anyone’s first thought be (Spoiler - click to show)‘OMG they Squid Game’d me!’ But the idea would be inescapable even if unprepared to accept it as a realistic possibility. (Hm, why did I irony quote ‘Real Life’ there? OMG it’s because I’m trapped in the game aren’t I? AREN’T I? AM I STILL PLAYING THIS GAME??

OR IS IT PLAYING ME???)

Ahem. I was talking about metagame context. The context is SO prominent that not only are the characters jarringly behind the curve, even the game’s central conceit and final twist is kind of telegraphed. So that when the characters and later the game play up major revelations with implied swelling music sting, you’re already there and have been snacking and doing crossword puzzles waiting for the game to catch up. And then its over, the final twist a victim of its own heavy-handed foreshadowing.

I think though, that this kind of narrative is polishable. Certainly, the core idea here is pretty cool. It requires a much defter, softer touch in foreshadowing. Change the name of the game to something bland and without baggage. Construct a not-so-familiar scenario, then misdirect characters with red herring reservations to keep the real machinery hidden. Do not explicitly ask the player questions (Spoiler - click to show)“Who is the player?” whose very posing reveals the conceit. What you’re after is to lean on misdirection to let the reveal impact the player as well as the characters. If you can manage it with metatext even better.

Between the lack of finesse and the dominance of the central conceit, all the sparks felt like incidental pops in the periphery. Their presence was nice but so tangential as to not lessen the fundamental Mechanical nature. Mostly Seamless implementation.

Played: 10/7/23
Playtime: 40min, finished
Artistic/Technical ratings: Mechanical, Mostly Seamless
Would Play After Comp?: No, Experience feels complete. Well, I would try a more subtle one as described above. Though then I would have THIS game as meta-context and… (Spoiler - click to show)THIS GAME WON’T STOP INCEPTIONING ME!!!

Artistic scale: Bouncy, Mechanical, Sparks of Joy, Engaging, Transcendent
Technical scale: Unplayable, Intrusive, Notable (Bugginess), Mostly Seamless, Seamless

Adapted from an IFCOMP23 Review

Last year I thoroughly embarrassed myself tossing around a “My Little Pony” reference in reviewing a work without any real understanding of the property. This year, my first impulse was to repeat my mistake by calling this work 'anime-inspired.' From a guy whose son is in the weeds with Anime, but whose only personal exposure was Starblazers/Spaceship Yamato (do I need to say decades ago?), this felt to me like a strongly Anime-influenced work. I have been subsequently informed by folks more knowledgable than me that this is not a compelling analog. *whew* embarrassment averted!

The setup is a persecution-turned-war between humanity and the titular Beat Witches: girls that at some point in their lives (tradition would say ‘onset of puberty’ but the work declines to specify) become mute psychic vampires, undone by music. Pretty cool, and to my untrained eye, could easily be an anime premise. (Also rife with potential metaphorical interpretation, though maybe kind of toxic. To be fair to the work, this does not seem to be its intent.) It is billed as ‘an interactive loneliness’ which is an intriguing blurb to be sure, though ultimately feels tangential to the goals of the work.

The opening is a pretty effective fakeout, though it does trade heavily on player knowledge lagging protagonist knowledge. I am always fascinated by this choice in IF. While this often work like gangbusters in movies - where what we think we see turns out to be surprisingly wrong – its use in IF carries more burden. When we are invited to inhabit the protagonist, there is a presumption of agency and alignment on the player’s part. When the twist is revealed it immediately creates a break between player and PC. It is a betrayal of sorts, made personal to the player rather than something they appreciated dispassionately. If the work leverages this frisson it can be quite interesting. If it apes movie tropes without understanding the difference, it cedes a goal in the first minute of play, and is playing catch up from there.

In the case of Beat Witch, it doesn’t feel intentional in the sense of deliberate player effect, but it is super consistent with gameplay. The game continually denies player agency to distancing effect. Mainstream puzzle IF can be uncharitably characterized as ‘on rails’ (narrative IF typically even more so). The author is positing a problem to which they have a solution in mind, and until the player regurgitates that solution they are blocked. But if the intent is to put the player in the driver’s seat this must be offset by real or perceived autonomy. The act of puzzle solving itself is one method, one of the first. Enabling multiple paths/solutions is another. Really deft wordsmithing to make the player feel autonomous and not detect the strings being pulled is yet another. Even something as simple as ‘open world exploration’ can give the player a flavor of it. Sure, to advance you have to do the specific framistat jiggering the author wants, but at least you can do it on your own time.

For my playthrough, none of these were in evidence. The vibe the piece is striving for is a hyperactive enhanced reality of action set pieces and cool visuals. Pace is absolutely a key element of all that, but the author refuses (maybe justifiably so) to trust the player to play along. Instead, the play space is constrained, choices are telegraphed the moment they’re needed and rejected any other time. A sequence that drove this home for me played out as follows:

- aah! bad things are happening, let me look around and see what I can leverage in the environment!
- (para) “Wow things are bad, but nothing is revealing itself”
- yikes! ok, let me try this other thing
- (para) “Well that didn’t work. You should probably look around now.”
- really, game? should I? should I look around now? ok, >L
- (para) “Hey! Here is this thing that is the only thing that will help you now!”

Even when I have the right idea, legitimately arrived at through player initiative, the game rejects my input because it prefers to LEAD me. That was particularly enraging, but the work makes these choices all the time. It is common that you only have one cardinal direction to move from place to place. The protagonist has unspecified ‘powers’ of some sort, and the game is super-ready to tell you ‘sadly that is not one of your powers’ but never tells nor provides a mechanism to define what those powers are! Then, powers (most especially super strength) that might have opened doors for you earlier are suddenly revealed. But wait, there are two powers the game explicitly tells you about, but almost never rewards their application! Except when the game DEMANDS their application. Even what may be the only legitimate choice you as a player have, how aggressive to be with the villain, is undermined because you are asked to specify it before you’ve actually met the villain. As a player I mean. The protagonist sure has a backstory that could inform things, but that is opaque to the player at the time of selection.

So, how much do you like the specific vibe I am describing? Because if you do like it, there are things to enjoy here. There are some effective, over the top horror and action set pieces. The pace is often frenetic and twisty. Physics is routinely sacrificed for a cool visual, things like teeth flying over modest impacts, glass shards defying physics. There are fun plot twists and a monologuing villain that falls short of even a single dimension but is so committed to their one note as to be entertaining. Even the details of the Beat Witches are just strange and specific enough to ring some bells. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the sole gameplay moment that landed for me: (Spoiler - click to show)a death scene and the subsequent, standard RESTART, RESTORE, UNDO or QUIT prompt was recontextualized in a delightful way. Unblur with caution, you probably want to experience that for yourself.

For me, it was not enough. I chafed at the author’s heavy hand too much to enjoy the rest. Mechanical and I’m going to call rejected player agency as Notably Intrusive. On top of that, I am THIS CLOSE to a penalty point for the line: “squeeze you like a juicy fart” but will refrain.

Played: 10/6/23
Playtime: 1.5hrs, finished
Score: 4 (Mechanical, Notably on rails)
Would Play After Comp?: No, not what I come to IF for

Adapted from an IFCOMP23 Review

Over time I have developed a love/hate relationship with Texture as an IF platform. There are a few things it does uniquely well. I am super enamored of the drag and drop paradigm. It suggests connecting thoughts in an organic way that is appealing to me. Because the connecting words are highlighted only after selecting a command, it can create intriguing surprises about the connections the author is offering. The text bubbles that appear when you connect words can similarly be used to great effect, refining the nature of the connection you just made. For me, it adds up to a powerful and unique authoring opportunity.

As much as I love those things though, there are two things I hate. Actually one I hate and another I HATE HATE HATE OMIGOD WHO DO I BLAME AND HOW DO I BRING THEM TO A DIRE RECKONING HATE. The former is that making those connections allows inline (rather than appended) text changes. On dense pages it creates a ‘hunt the new text’ problem, where new text probably but not necessarily shows up where you just clicked. Because it is most buried in large blocks of text it also means often REREADING large blocks of text desperately searching for the New Thing.

That’s bad, but the factor that aggrieves me beyond all rational thought is the font-resize problem. Texture dynamically resizes font, based on text volume and window size. You’re not getting it? Every page potentially changes its font size during play as text is added, sometimes multiple times and WILDLY so. Then all over again with a new page. How are you not as mad as me now? My hands are trembling in fury and/or PTSD just typing about it. It is maybe the worst reading experience since Catholic Grade School where nuns whack you with rulers on mispronunciations.

So, this is a Texture piece. Like most, it will live and die by how it maximizes its platform’s strengths and minimizes its… challenges. Let me say that differently. A Texture piece that does NOTHING on either front is going to default to infuriating, without counterbalancing merits. That is an unfair burden to place on even the strongest narrative. Fall may not recognize that peril and is brought down (heh) by it.

Fall is a surreal, metaphorical story about connections and fear while navigating a life we have little control over. It is about perfectly sized for what it is, though maybe the narrative balance is a bit off. We spend what feels like 1/3 of the time getting to know our two mains vs 2/3 describing the weird environment they are in. That feels imbalanced, though I didn’t count words and maybe my impression is off. If it is, then I would say the time could be better used, as at the end I had only the vaguest sympathy for the pair. The details were a little too generic to enthrall me, which is a weird thing to say about a person in a spiked leather jacket. The message of the piece was well taken, but lacked emotional punch.

To leveraging Texture’s strengths, I consistently (and painfully) felt missed opportunities abounded. Most word connections were exactly what you thought they would be, and the connection-bubbles basically concatenated the two words rather than offering any surprising insight or nuance. That reduced the drag and drop to a nifty variation on Twine/Choicescript “click the options.” In some cases, connection choices remained on the page even when there were no further connections to be made.

And those Texture-Cons? Hoobidy, they were present in spades. Font Dancing was my persistent companion, made worse when Text Hunting revealed the connection I made was say an eye color and nothing more. I think maybe Texture is the Arc Welder of IF authoring tools. Insanely powerful in practiced hands, guaranteed to severely injure the enthusiastic novice. I’m going to inaugurate another review sub-series here, “Playing With Matches,” to tie the IFComp23 Texture reviews together!

Played: 10/6/23
Playtime: 20min, 2 playthroughs, different choices changing nothing
Artistic/Technical ratings: Mechanical, Notably buggy. Why not Intrusive? Honestly, because 1. it is short and 2. Its page length sometimes dodged resizing which elicited actual sighs of relief during gameplay.
Would Play After Comp?: No, experience feels complete

Artistic scale: Bouncy, Mechanical, Sparks of Joy, Engaging, Transcendent
Technical scale: Unplayable, Intrusive, Notable (Bugginess), Mostly Seamless, Seamless

Adapted from an IFCOMP23 Review

“I love your work.”
“You mean, you love to watch me die.”

Students? This is how you start a film. Crisp dialogue, like a punch in the chest. Get the audience enthralled from the get go. Today we are studying a retro-Giallo, Barcarolle in Yellow. I trust you have done the required reading, and viewed the background Argento, Fulci, Bava. You’ll want that background later when we cover DePalma as well.

First thoughts. Anyone? Hm, let me prime the conversation a bit. Note the playful opening credits, the rapid single dialogue snapshots, intercut with spare authorship text, building to the roar of the graphical title page. Delightful. The graphical design of that title page itself is pitch perfect in setting the mood.

Then the complete break to… anyone? Spaghetti Western, yes of course. The western scene that itself was a fakeout to introduce our star. Terrific use of pace and misdirection to keep the audience on its toes, looking for purchase. I am hard pressed to think of a film that so sure-handedly established its protagonist, mood and expectations.

What do we think of the train station scene? Less focused, no? It starts to get away from the director here. I’m sure you all spotted some technical issues, anyone? Yes, our protagonist seemed to search too long for the right wordplay. The director insisted on overprecise blocking, but declined to leave instructions for the actors. The effect was a floundering performance, where if the actress did not say or do the EXACT phrase, the ensemble left her hanging. The ‘hail a cab’ sequence was particularly befuddling where sometimes it was on screen, and sometimes not without clear explanation. The director helpfully provided a script, but it was woefully incomplete. In the later bridge scene it was actually deceptive, but lets stay in the train station a bit longer.

After an interminable march of repeated dream sequence deaths or static head turning, I hope you all consulted the provided shooting guides. The “Walkthrough” in the parlance of this director. You will note that what the director was looking for was (Spoiler - click to show)a dropped scarf. You cannot fault the actress for not reading her director’s mind. Only after this arbitrary and unforeshadowed detail is finally serviced do we proceed, nearly a half of our runtime expired! You will note some jarring editing choices there, too. Previous characters appearing from nowhere, non sequitor dialogue and inexplicable footage of the director themself intercut with a tense chase scene.

What do we think of the production values on display here? The Venice setting is lovingly rendered in the large, but closeups suffer. Granted, this can be an afterthought to some giallo, but the masters perversely paid INSANE attention to it. For Argento it sometimes was the POINT of a scene. There are flashes in Barcarolle, but all too often the camera panned too far one way or the other and the set was exposed on screen. Even for simple things, like views through windows. The film makes the curious choice to chide the lead actress for these shortcomings. At first playful it starts to feel vindictive after a while.

There is a short scene of voyeurism and aggressive sexual tension that does some work to restoring the atmosphere of the piece, though even there, the director character inexplicably repeats their dialogue.

The subsequent bridge scene repeats a lot of the sins of the train terminal. Our protagonist is asked to perform to a script that turns out to not be what the director wanted. One sequence, where the script called for (Spoiler - click to show)snapping a photo of the bridge, then the antagonist, until the protagonist did them in reverse order the scene was allowed to drag. Similarly, her scene partner was supposed to be a provocatively dressed woman, when (Spoiler - click to show)the bit player was instead an elderly man. The main actress can be forgiven thinking she was off mark for long stretches of time there.

It ends with a tense fall from the bridge, to a dream death after reasonable attempts to swim to safety are rebuffed.

Well, that was as far as we were assigned today! So how do we assess this effort so far class? It seems hard to believe the director is allowing the lead actress to flounder (with contradictory instructions!) without some underlying purpose or artistic statement in mind. But if intentional, the first two hours show no hint of it. Even if true, I think the impact on the audience is the same - without access to the “walkthrough” the audience has no practical hope of understanding the work. Certainly, modern multi-media artworks utilize this kind of cross-media trick, but for a retro-Giallo it seems misplaced. The directorial choices, and perhaps sloppy shortcomings are deeply Intrusive to the viewer’s experience. And yet, do not lose sight of that powerful beginning, and many wonderful details throughout the work. There are Sparks to this work without question.

I see our time is nearly up. For tomorrow, let’s look at the cross influences of Hitchock and Giallo. We will return to this work after the semester is complete, for those interested in extra credit.

Played: 10/6/23
Playtime: 2hrs, not finished
Artistic/Technical ratings: Intrusively Buggy, almost Unplayable without walkthrough. Sparks of Joy in subject matter and opening sequences
Would Play After Comp?: Probably. I am too enamored of the source inspiration not to.

Artistic scale: Bouncy, Mechanical, Sparks of Joy, Engaging, Transcendent
Technical scale: Unplayable, Intrusive, Notable (Bugginess), Mostly Seamless, Seamless

Adapted from an IFCOMP23 Review

How can you be mad at a game that checks all these boxes?
- Amiable, pleasant protagonist
- Light, character-based humor
- Solid but non-urgent plot
- Lovingly rendered from a place of knowledge and affection

It hurts my heart when despite all that goodwill, I cannot connect with the material in the way the author does. I am a cold, emotionless husk it seems. My play experience was characterized by in-the-moment investment but tellingly, little regret when my gameplay led to unwanted/unintended places. I just kind of rolled with it.

Let me start by emphasizing the game’s superpower. It is chockablock with specificity, both in the setting, the characters that inhabit it, and the B&B that is the central location. The setup is, you are tasked to run your Grandmother’s B&B for a week, a job you are uncertainly prepared for. It is all painted so smoothly and effortlessly with straightforward, effective prose. All too often, I find IF text showy and distracting. Here, the text disappears and images and events are planted in your mind with economical aplomb.

The choice to make the narrator the main protagonists’ stream of consciousness is well taken. It allows for often wry comic observations to also simultaneously act as scene-setting and character building moments. It’s not a chuckle-fest, that’s not how the protagonist rolls, but there are smiles aplenty to be had from their understated comedic observations.

The NPC work is similarly effective - the array of guests and staff all have unique personalities and voices, and must be interacted with uniquely. As a writer, this is often much harder than it looks but plays out seamlessly here. As a hospitality host your job is to make them happy, and it does feel like the tasks (and results) are satisfyingly specific to the personalities involved. Really strong verisimilitude and world building.

So. With all that going for it, why did I feel at arms’ length the entire time? For one thing, early on you are asked to establish the protagonist’s goals. The scenario is very subtle and complex! It is overrun with NPC personalities and protagonist motivations! That kind of complexity itself is hard to do so well, and another reflection of the author’s talent. But the player choices are more constrained. I selected what felt best to me, but the ensuing gameplay kind of sidelined that choice in away that felt… ignored? The author painted a nuanced set up, but the IF-specific demands of player choice anticipation were just too great to honor those choices. It’s hard to get my head around. The day to day operation, much like life, is NOT preoccupied with overarching life goals and shouldn’t be. But the author is SO talented at soft word choice character building, even the phrasing of ongoing events pushed against my mental model of the PC.

The other facet that I think kept me at a remove was the problem set. Now, with this setup you can easily imagine a comedically escalating madcap farce of compounding, competing crises. This is not that, and doesn’t need to be. Instead, you get a series of low-key hospitality issues to manage, each with multiple reasonable and straightforward strategies to resolve. You may make a soft choice of prioritization, but nothing dire. I think maybe the protagonist specificity worked against things here. You make choices, yes, but the protagonist knows so much more about B&B running than you do (thankfully!) that they do the heavy lifting of problem solving once you nudge them in a direction. Often utilizing skills or knowledge it wasn’t clear they had when you made the choice. That gameplay decision had the effect of keeping me from fully inhabiting the protagonist, and more watching them work. Yes, I wanted good things for them, but I wasn’t convinced they needed me to make those happen.

There is a climactic problem to solve, again seemingly more under the protag’s power than my own, and then a final choice. The dramatic arc is there for sure, it just felt like my participation was more directorial than performative. “Sparks of Joy” is the measure I chose for my rubric, but how does that map to “Low, Pleasant Glow”? Was it Mechanical for me? Kind of, but not with the cold disappointment that metric implies. Implementation-wise it was mostly seamless - there was some wonkiness up front with version selection but clean after that. I guess I have to go with Mechanical, Mostly Seamless, but that rating really sells short the super strong writing and warm vibe of the piece.

Played: 10/4/23
Playtime: 1.25hrs, finished
Artistic/Technical ratings:
Mechanical, Mostly Seamless, bonus for warming my cold heart at least a little.
Would Play After Comp?: No, experience feels complete

Artistic scale: Bouncy, Mechanical, Sparks of Joy, Engaging, Transcendent
Technical scale: Unplayable, Intrusive, Notable (Bugginess), Mostly Seamless, Seamless

Adapted from an IFCOMP23 Review

This author is all over the map, we know this about him. He has produced games that tickled me, engaged my math-puzzle brain, and bounced me with material not for me. This entry recalls my favorite product line of his, the… Wordplay line? Here, we are engaging Spooneristic items and locations, trying to match them, to notionally transform them into their better Spooner partner! An example: I would give anything to turn a Gabby Trump into a Tabby Grump. (Cat-skeptics are much better than Mad Despots! That is its better form!) Should I use a generous do-gooder, the Gifty Nun or… the other? Ehh, maybe don’t ask me that question.

The fun here is the wild logic leaps it takes to use say a “dummy scoop” to somehow transform a “Zany Brew.” (NOT A REAL EXAMPLE. WELL, NOT EXACTLY.) They are not obvious, they are not fair, but boy are they fun. It is a somewhat trivial puzzle, easily solvable by trial and error, but much more fun when you try to outguess and predict what moon logic contortions are going to effect the transform. It is a short lark I took my time with. It lands where most short larks do for me - Insanely sparky just short of Engaging. Seamlessly implemented. Such a good use of 45min.

But really game, this is FAR from Trail Stash! I would purchase endless 50’s song compilations through Crooner Spam to get my Spooner Cram!

Played: 10/4/23
Playtime: 45min, finished
Artistic/Technical ratings: Sparks of Joy, Seamless
Would Play After Comp?: No, experience feels complete


Artistic scale: Bouncy, Mechanical, Sparks of Joy, Engaging, Transcendent
Technical scale: Unplayable, Intrusive, Notable (Bugginess), Mostly Seamless, Seamless