Reviews by manonamora

With a superhero/villain setting, Moonstrike is a relatively long game, both in terms of word count and passage length, in an almost kinetic form with its singular ending and limited choices.

The setting is a bit silly, as you are a vigilante trying to take down a villain that just escape, while trying to keep your identity concealed and your life in checked. But these kinds of premise is fun to explore, especially the balance of silliness of the situation and the more serious aspect of the vigilante reality.

While I liked the premise of the game, I did find some issues with the pacing of the story. Part of it stems from the lengths of the passages (from 3-6 word pages by glance). Without regular break, beats of the story seem to drag on more than they should or goes against the fast-paced actions sequences (like the fights).
Another part would be the relatively restricted interactivity. Because of those long passages (often multiple ones at a time), the available actions for the player are few and far between, rendering us a bit more passive than the setting would warrant (why not have a proper fight sequence?)

Another reason for me was the confusing passing of time. We're told at the start of the game we're hunting a villain, and that time is of the essence, but good thing you are on a short break right now! But some actions to track the villain take weeks to process. Or you seem to spend so much time on random things (the middle section at the mechanic shop felt much longer than it actually was? or the drive before meeting the bad guy). In any case, by the end of the game, it was unclear whether it had just been a few days since the start of the story or months.

I did enjoy the funny moments and quibs between characters, especially between the PC and the villain. I'm pretty sure we're supposed to root for the PC throughout the game, but the villain was my favourite character. So chaotic.

A short cute kinetic(-ish) story about the what are/could/should have been in ChoiceScript. The writing is full of emotion, (unrequited?) feelings, and maybe even a hint of regret. Retrospection is a big focus of the story itself.

A strange thing from it was the choice of the You's and I's here. In usual ChoiceScript fashion, the main body of the text refers to the player as You, while it uses I for the choice options. In this game, You's and I's share the same space. Are we supposed to be the I and reflect on our feelings and relationships? or the You and discover how bad of a friends we probably are?
The ambiguity of it made me a bit confused, but I liked it as well.

This was a fairly basic adventure game, with a combat/inventory/market system. You fight "monsters", get coins, try to balance your health/hunger, and if you're lucky, get to the finish line (or you die). Coded in python, the game uses numbers as inputs rather than your typical parser commands.

Though the fights are randomly generated (in the name of the "monster", attacks felt, and rewards), it becomes repetitive quite quickly. After a dozen of fight, seeing the retro ASCII art bud swing its sword... eh.
I died before reaching the required 100 fights, but didn't feel the need nor want to try to beat the game.

Would be the nice base for a larger project though. The mechanic itself works fine.

The Witch is a fairly difficult parser where you must save the snatched villagers, though how to do so or solve the puzzles along the way is not quite clear. There are limits in both the inventory and turn count. The entry does not include an in-game help or hint system, but an external transcript walkthrough is included. I reached a total of 60 points before stopping playing (using the walkthrough for help).

Knowing my (in)aptitude in playing parsers, I wasn't expecting to sweep through the puzzles and reach the end easy-peasy. I just hoped to be able to solve at least one puzzle all by myself. It became quickly apparent I wouldn't be able to do much by myself without the walkthrough either.

Aside from the blurb, the game gives you little indication of what you are supposed to do. You are essentially dropped in this world, left to your own devices. You can explore the world, pick some stuff up, interact with elements around you... and hope for the best. I found myself running around the world, and ended up stuck in some sort of tree that wouldn't let me leave*.
*was there a hint somewhere about the order of actions you should input?

Going through the rooms, I kept wondering if I missed some clue or if there was some context about the game or story I should have known about or found before getting to certain locations. It kind of felt you had to do quite a bit of guesswork... and that was a bit frustrating.

The game was not meant with beginners in mind. More experienced parsers will probably have a more enjoyable time than I did and probably find the puzzles ingenious.

Sitting at over 400k total words, One Knight Stand is quite a sizeable game, with extensive branching. It also is a demo (prologue + 1st chapter), meant to be part of a longer series. Characterised as a mashup between Among Us and Arthurian lore, the story will twist and turn at every corner. I found one Dead End.

The game is very much anchored in the ChoiceofGame style of interactive fiction, with its extensive, almost overwhelming, character creation, lengthy playthroughs, and variation galore. Replay value seems to be an important part of this entry, due to the many many choices available (some are even locked depending on previous choices).

While the amount of available content is impressive (400k for a single chapter is massive), the pace of the story is at times painfully slow. In part due to the extensive nature of the character creation. From requiring you to confirm every single character-building choice, to going into details about some trivial options (like the shade of your favourite colour has a dozen of option per hue), it often felt unnecessary and tiresome (be prepared for choice-fatigue here...).

The entry starts pretty intriguing, with a spooky nightmare set in an Arthurian setting, with a bone-chilling feeling that continues to follow you throughout the rest of the chapter (with creepy voices and creepy feelings)*. To balance it out, the prose strive to add humour when it can, from mentions of or punny winks about mainstream media (Knights of Our Lives, lol), to taking an almost sarcastic or parody approach to some situations**. The balance was not quite there, however, making me question whether the story was supposed to be primarily comedy or horror.
*I had a bit checked-out by the time the horror started to pick up.
** It's kinda funny a fast-food server can be part of a Polo club...

While I was not particularly fan of the pronoun switch between the main text (you) and the choice list (I), as it sometimes broke the flow of reading, [NOTE:this is the ChoiceofGame style] the formatting of the more horror-y beats (especially the ones with creepy sounds or anxious feelings) helped keeping things fresh.
Another thing I hope will be used further into the game was the phone element, specifically the texting side-"game". The options of sending back messages were pretty funny (yay for creepypasta).

For a ChoiceofGame style game, it has a pretty solid base and I suspect it could become quite popular with CoG fans. But I don't think it's my kind of game (I was almost relieved when I reached the end, even if it wasn't a "good" one).

I'm calling it now: you are the long lost child of the Phone Company CEO.

GameCeption is "a game within a game" action thriller, where the goal is for you and your friend to win the gaming competition, and win the much needed prize (money!). The game you must play, however, is really not what it seems...

I'll say it out of the gate: I liked this game. It was nicely paced*, with engaging gameplay and choice, and a pretty stylised UI (I'm a sucker for a sci-fi-esc interface). Even if I saw the twist coming from a mile away, I was still pretty entertained, and felt vindicated when proven right! I thought the game knocked it out of the park.
*timed text on replay was a taaaaad annoying, esp when trying to speed run the last part

I liked the differences between the two parts of the competition, both in terms of styling of the page and the text itself. As both parts sort of mirror each other, especially in terms of action, there is just enough distinctiveness between both parts to make it feel fresh. The "parser"-like actions with the links added to the game competition aspect.

While characterised as an action thriller, I think Survival, à-la Battle Royale, might fit the game even better, especially considering the gameplay when the competition starts. Though the interface of the game and the cover art would maybe give the expectation of a more sci-fi like entry.

For a game with multiple "losing" state, I appreciated "respawning" at the last major point, avoiding replaying the whole game to get back to the action.

Maybe a less positive point, it would be in the characterisation of the protagonists' relationship. It was maybe left a bit too vague for the question at the 'interview' to hit harder.

20 Exchange Place is hostage-situation high-stake game where you play a Sergeant trying to solve a sticky situation. The game offers multiple consequential choices, with many leading to a bad ending. I would rate this game Cruel on Zarf's difficulty's scale. I know it is possible to reach a "good" ending, but didn't manage even with my many attempts.

This game is... frustrating, especially as someone who wants to do good when playing game, and strive to reach at a minimum the least harmful ending as possible. I usually don't mind replaying, until I find a (somewhat) satisfying result. But here, I gave up after a good half-dozen try. And savescuming is difficult with Ink (only one slot, not possible to go back to a previous choice). Meaning you often need to go through the whole game again to change one thing.

20 Exchange Place is very much a "golden"/"only-one-true" path type of game, and if you stray from it, you will face harsh consequences. And while each failed state will get its own extensive variation, having to restart the whole thing every time (especially when you are pretty far along) is tedious at best.

The difficulty of the game is that you are pretty blind when choosing what to do next, as there are little to no indications in the text about the correct choice/approach, which is frustrating when the PC is supposed to be a veteran on the job (or are you just that stupid?). Even choices characterised as "safe" lead you down a bad path.
This is kinda the type of game where you need some sort of walkthrough...

While the prose does a good job at setting the scene, and pushing the high-stake envelope about the situation, I also found it awkward at times. This was made even more obvious with the missing punctuation in the dialogues, or the censoring of "bad" and "swear" words, which, considering the indicated genre and content warning, feels out of place.
Is hell a bad word? I think it was most in the context of swearing...

We All Fall Together is a short surrealist game about "taking the plunge" and facing things head on. Made in Texture, you click-n-drag actions towards specific block of words to affect the displayed text or move the story along. There is only one ending.

With its fantastical setting (you falling towards the eye of a storm, falling with others), WAFT proposes a very simple and silly game. Yet, intertwined the silliness, the game discusses a very human trait: the fear of just... doing things. Of diving head forwards into things. Of avoiding situations for fear it will end badly...

It was a fine small entry. Though I wished it had dived maybe a bit more into your fears.

M:REU is a large parser game, reminiscent of the old Infocom era, and very much a love letter to the original HHGG game and the HHGG lore. The story follows the event of the second book of the HHGG series, in which the protagonist makes their way towards Milliways, the restaurant at the end of the universe. It combines puzzles and exploration, and includes hints and a walkthrough.

It can't be completed in 2h. I did not reach the end.

When starting the game, I knew I would not be able to finish it within the 2h mark (I remember the beta call mentioning a 8h-long playthrough...), nor would I have been able to go through the different parts without losing/dying (its difficulty being cruel, one wrong move and you die). But I did not expect the quality of the game to be this impressive, considering this is the first game of this author and the fact that the game had been re-coded a few months prior to the comp.

Through my limited playthrough (I managed to get to the 4th location?), it is clear this was a labour of love for the old Infocom games, and the HHGG universe. The game manages to encapsulate the wittiness of the books so well, from the description of your actions, to the error messages, or the in-game hints. I gladly tried to die, just to see the funny messages, and the game calling me a noob for being a bad player (only saying the truth there...).

Some of the puzzles seem a bit obtuse, and require either knowledge of the story or some trial an error (thank you, walkthrough for the help). They are definitely not meant for first-time parser players. Even trying to understand the hints, or follow the walkthrough, it is pretty easy to make an error and see your progress blocked completely.

Close to the 2h-mark, I stumbled into the Milliways kitchen, tried (and failed) to wrangle with the cupboard and my inventory. At some point, the cupboard just refused to open, and the timer rang. I still tried to play a tiny bit more, undoing previous actions and redo the puzzle, but alas, I could not get it past (it was a bug, it turns out).

Honestly, from the little I played, it is really impressive, and could pass for an official game.
Maybe I'll restart it later and try to play it fully.

[Originally played on 2-Oct during the IFComp]

The Vambrace of Destiny is a dungeon crawler adventure, with limited commands and filled with puzzles. You must go through the different levels of the dungeon, fight monsters, discover treasures, and gather all the spells.

I did not reach the ending. The current review only account for what was played.

Until I reached the second level and was essentially stuck, banging my head against the wall because I could not solve the puzzles, TVoD was quite an enjoyable light parser (especially for a parser-adverse/noob like me). It has limited commands, which are essentially shortcuts; a visible map on the screen (at least in the play online version), which showed where you are and what rooms you discovered, and reasonable logical puzzles (even the one I got stuck on...), and hints (external document).

The logic of the game is relatively simple: explore the dungeon, find a monster but can't fight it, explore some more, find a spell, fight the monster with the spell, go to the next bit. As you advance further, the puzzles require extra steps to be solved, often with combinations of actions or "passing a turn". Even if some puzzles required retracing your steps to unlock further parts, they were quite enjoyable to solve!

I still spent enough time faffing about, pressing the wrong direction on the screen, or forgetting to press a certain command, or just not getting the puzzle, that the clock ran out before I could reach the end. Starting level 2, the puzzles leave the beginner level... I think I managed to visit 1/3 to 1/2 of the rooms of level 2 before I gave up.

Still, I had quite a bit of fun, and breaking through the blocks on the path, defeating the monsters, and finding the treasures, were pretty satisfying! Level 1 is a hoot!
I really appreciated the simple commands (the investigrab especially!) and how merciful the game was (you might not manage to solve a puzzle or finish the game, but you won't die).

I want to revisit this game down the line (aka when a walkthrough drop - the hints are not enough for a noob), because I really want to reach the end.

[Originally played on 1-Oct during the IFComp]