Reviews by manonamora

Cloak of Cleansing is a short parser, as a spoof of the Cloak of Darkness. Unlike the original, the world has been expanded and the goal as changed. You do not start with a cloak on your shoulders, but rather, must find your own. The message in the bar is still there, but is now too obscene to be displayed on screen or interact with. Instead, you must interact with a new NPC who will reward you for your unique “sense of style” (I think there’s a HHGG reference there?). Most of the game is pretty railroady after that puzzle is completed, and a sudden shift in tone/genre.

The parser is fairly bare with only a limited amount of command defined (or giving a response - even X ME doesn’t do much). I’m pretty sure I ran into a bug in the bar as well, where I ended up being stuck, unable to go back to the foyer (going against the “you can’t lose” admission in the blurb).

Why? is a kinetic entry created for the Really Bad IF, where you follow/are Luna, a transgender girl going about her day(s), talking to other people or herself. It is pretty nonsensical, especially with each scene loosely connected to the next and with typos everywhere adding on to the confusion (sometime it’s even played for laughs!), or when the game fakes an early ending. There are some funny lines and statements, making the more obviously bad elements worse.

I am oblivious to the fact that my best friend is a vampire is a fantasy slice-of-life Ink (Calico) story, where you’ve invited your best friend to spend the evening doing things that friends do: watch a movie, play some games, have some food, chat, and what not. But, as the title suggests, your best friend is not… quite human - a fact you are completely oblivious about, even when the signs are all there!

With each sequence, you have multiple options to interact with Nico (that’s your lovely friend btw, who brought cake!), though you will end up with the same general sequence of event: Nico enters, you have some activities, they want to talk to you. Yet, it doesn’t matter that the only obvious effect you have on the evening is which activities you do and in which order. Because…

… it’s just lovely. Your interactions with Nico are super nice, and awkward and embarrassing at times. Even if you are oblivious to the major signs, the dialogue is really charming and funny. I laughed quite a bit while playing, especially at all the vampire references going over “You”.

Country Song Ghostwriting Simulator is a short Twine game in which your cousin Trevor asks you to help him write a banger of a country song. If you do not refuse, you are given a handful of topics to write that song. There are about a half-dozen endings.

Save for one path that is downright heartbreaking, the whole game is pretty hilarious. From the listed tropes of current country song topics (Beer, Girls, Truck, USA!!! and maybe Jesus/Satan), to the twist-takes on each topic, you actually get some really really funny (fake) country songs right on the page. I laughed SO HARD at the Hot Girls option. If these were actually playing on the radio, I would not question it.

But there is also that one sad path. If you do not write that country song with your cousin, you go down a pretty dark path. I think it might be the longest of all the entries, and it is really sad, maybe bitter sweet at the end, but still. I chose it first, and it might have been the best way to experience the game, cause it’s really a bummer path.

Overall, a pretty good short and humoristic game!

Cool as a Cucumber is a slice-of-life visual novel where you wake up without any of your memories and must meet again all your male roommates. Set up as some sort romance story, you fall in love with one of them, and are ready to do anything to get him to fall in love in you. There are a handful of choices throughout the game, but only one (the last one) seems to matter to get one of the three endings.

It doesn’t makes much sense, to why this band of people share a house with you (especially since one of them has essentially been isekai’ed here, and another is a merman??), nor does the game expand on how you got this way. It even goes in contradiction with itself (saying it’s hot outside but showing a snowy background). But there are some funny elements parsed throughout, if you like that second-hand embarrassment kind of humour.

mall_walk is a short weirdcore interactive point-and-click piece, where you can explore a grayscale mall except for one dark path. There’s also a strange shape you can interact with, with some of the listed options allowing you to explore a supplementary part. I don’t think you can leave the mall, nor is there a concrete ending.

I think does the weirdcore vibes justice, letting the images speak for themselves with the way they are edited. The dithering effect on each screen seals the deals on that. And how you meet and get closer to the shape is creepy as heck.

A Colorful World is a cute short visual novel, where two friends (who I believe are children) meet, play some games and have fun together. It’s really simple, with only a couple of choices, and essentially two paths to see all there is to it.

The interface is pretty simple, with a static background showing the two protagonist, drawn in a child-like matter (with like crayons), and with a cute little background track.
It really is cute, and child-friendly!

Grocery Quest is a short humorous Twine game where you play as an elf, in a quest of acquiring a Slushy and a Hot Dog at the local Fantasy 7-11. But the path between you and the desired item is essentially cursed: you will need to be careful in your actions and movements to get there safely, and retrieve said items with your life. There are multiple endings, with the winning state requiring a bit of sleuthing.

Even if short, it was pretty funny. The humour is on point and it made me want to get that elf its darn meal! I chuckled a lot. It’s pretty absurd, but it’s also my kind of jam. I also liked the use of formatting of part of the text, adding to the silliness of it all!

ohhh dear is a tiny Twine story about crows, and their wish to better crowkind. You (apparently being a crow too) must choose the course of action that will set the crows’ future, by choosing one of two options. You are not given the specifics on what those options are, learning only about their consequences when you choose them. There are two endings, neither of them being particularly great for you.

Half of the “game” is however spent on a short tangent about how the game came to be, rather than the story itself, kinda chopping off its wings before it could actually fly. Which is a shame because it could make for a fun concept (from what I’ve gathered of the endings). But props for putting it together so soon before the deadline, like participating in Speed-IF without it being a restriction xD.

Wedding Party is a parser-like game where you are currently attending, as the title suggests, a wedding party. During the main event, you are presented with multiple possible actions, from leaving the wedding to very strange behaviours (like squeaking?! it’s also a counter?). You also able to move around, seeing other spots at the wedding and interacting with NPCs. If there is an ending to it, I didn’t find it.

Oh, and there’s a bit red button that you can press! Which of course I did.

I’m not sure what the whole point was, though your available actions nudges you to essentially disrupt the wedding (making people very confused at best, disgusted probably). You can run away loudly for some reason, and can’t really get back to the party after that (the movements buttons don’t really work). You can interact with things, though there doesn’t seem to be much effect to it.

Shame the red button doesn’t really end the whole game right away.