Reviews by Froggy

Oh my gosh, Anchorhead is absolutely fantastic. I played the original 1998 version and I loved every second of it. Played it for a day straight and just couldn't put it down; I tried to go to bed at one point and just ended up getting up two hours later to finish it. The writing weaves an incredibly beautiful and atmospheric description of each and every area, character, item - honestly I don't think this game is lacking in any aspect whatsoever. You can examine pretty much everything and everyone, and find tantalising clues and information everywhere you go. The history and backlore is rich and detailed - I found myself starting a set of notes just so that I could keep track of things and make links and connections, which made it even more exciting! The story builds layer upon layer of tension, beginning with just a slight unease and ramping up the mystery and thrill with each and every piece of information that you uncover. It's challenging, engaging, exciting, terrifying, heartwarming, and utterly brilliant.

Just make sure to save fairly regularly; you never know what you're going to find.

I liked the humorous and unexpected ways to die, but it's a short game and I sort of felt like it was made up of in-jokes that I didn't understand, if that makes sense. Maybe it's just that it's not in the format that I prefer. Worth a play!

I liked the concept and was interested by both the subject matter and the hyperlink format of exploring various story routes, but didn't find it particularly engaging, as it felt a lot more impersonal than the other IF games I've played, which usually put you in one of the character's shoes.

Having played Night House as my first ever digital interactive fiction, and having adored it, I figured I'd stick to the same author and try another of Bitter Karella's games. Glad I did! This is a very humorous game with lots to look at, lots to do, and lots of people to talk to! Incredibly imaginative, wonderfully descriptive, great character- and world-building, fab plot and wonderful puzzles - the type that are intuitive enough to solve, but hard enough that they take a while and you feel pretty pleased with yourself when you figure them out! Can't wait to play the rest of the Lil Ragamuffin series.

This was the first digital interactive fiction game that I've played, and I absolutely fell in love! It's fairly short - I think I completed it in a few hours - but the writing is lovely and descriptive, the backstory is excellent, with lots of little bits of history to piece together, and the twist was great and quite unexpected! I also really warmed to the characters involved in the story, which is a great sign to me that the writing, world- and character-building, and plot are really well thought out and very engaging. I was surprised by how creepy I found it - definitely glad that I played it during daylight, and still had to look over my shoulder several times because the hairs on the back of my neck were standing up! I also really liked the simplistic map format, made it easy to tell where you were but left all the description to the writing and the imagination. 100% loved it.