Reviews by manonamora
inkjam
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Surrealist Insanity, November 5, 2023This game is downright absurd and really anchored in surrealism. I first played it when the Italian version was only available, relying on my little knowledge of the language and French-ism to get by (and was completely lost), then replayed it in English (and was slightly less lost).
The gist is that you're appearing in a TV show called the Good Day Show (a bit of a joke on those Good Day morning program), but you don't know how you got there, why you are here, and how you'd be able to get home. The host is not at all helpful and will not sooth your anxiety. Oh, and there's a cooking portion (have not beaten it).
The visuals are honestly insane (in a good way), with some bizarre abstract collage of bits to make sprites. It kind of reminded me of those weird modern pieces you'd find in museums.
A different way to display text, November 5, 2023This was a very short game to show off the mechanic rather than a story. Words flash on the screen one by one, testing your reading ability (though there is a speed setting) and reflexes when a choice is given (using arrows to choose an option). Some options are timed, others are not.
There are a handful of endings, which can all be found in 5min since the "story" is so short. However, this also make the novelty of the gameplay running out quickly. I do wonder if the novelty would still grow old quickly had the story been longer...
a lo-fi game to relax to, November 5, 2023The game describes itself as a 'lo-fi game to relax to', and it does not lie! From the interface and its calming palette, the background music chosen, or the vibes of it all, the game is reminiscent of those lo-fi playlist you'd find on Youtube. It is a very cozy game, with low stake and a chill storylet structure with a slow progress.
As always: + 1 for the cat, and being able to play with it!
Creepy puzzle with rogue-like vibes, November 5, 2023This played like a dungeon crawler/rogue-like, with a puzzle determining your fate. There is a specific order to interact with the elements, that is very subtly hinted within the text - it is very easy to die (and I did... quite a lot!).
As the narration is limited to descriptions or responses to the gameplay, what shines the most is the Interface of the game. The illustrations in the background evokes death and suffering (which you feel interacting with things in the temple), and are pretty well done.
The vibes of the game are neat!
Interesting moody set up, November 5, 2023Though it is an incomplete story (you are warned on the game page), there is something pretty intriguing with the premise. The game sets down bits of a mystery and hints of potential intrigue. Still, there is good tension with the writing, as well as a compelling moodiness.
I hope there is a future release to complete the story.
A delightful 15min, November 5, 2023This was such a fun and quick treat. A very cozy game where you gather around ingredients to create treats for customers. The gameplay is quite simple (go somewhere, get stuff, maybe barter for other stuff), and you can't lose either. The UI is also quite polished with fun graphics, reminiscing of pixel RPGs.
One of my favourite entry of the inkJam.
Prototype with potential, November 5, 2023This game was build in a time-cave type of branching (each choice branches out, potentially to an ending), which means quite many endings for the size of the game. As there are a lots of paths (maybe too many considering the allotted time), many of them felt incomplete or ending abruptly.
The author does shine in the writing, with their vivid descriptions, how thought out the concept chosen was (body-snaching through eye-contact, that's neat and creepy). But it also at times felt distracting and confusing.
Lots of good potential in there, if the author decides to come back to it!
This game rest heavily on vibes and poetic prose, with loosely connected spaces, rather than a more traditional story with a clear start and end. Through it all, you explore imagined places in some sort of dream-like state, where poetry take a centre stage, both in the theme, the writing, and the choices.
Because of the style and themes, this will affect some readers more than others. I tend to have a harder time connecting with poetic prose.
Lie detector test, but for your humanity, November 4, 2023In a quite Blade Runner vibe, you are tasked to assess whether the person in front of you is a human or an android. Others trust your judgement, because you were the best at taking down androids before now. So you sit down, ask the person questions, check the outputs of the instruments (that supposedly help you gauge one's humanity through their eye movements), and make your judgement...
The game itself is pretty short (you only judge one person), which makes sense since it is listed as a prototype on itch. But I kind of wish there was more to it? maybe judging multiple people rather than just one, or get the consequences of your judgement (were they truly human or android? what if you chose wrong?).
The mechanic of the instrument readings is pretty neat, using graphics to help you assess whether eye movement is within the wanted bounds. It also bring the terrifying questions of what makes an individual a human, or how we quantify humanity, or whether we should strive to make androids as human-like as possible? Where does the android truly ends and humanity starts?
A delightful approach to Kafka's Metamorphosis, November 4, 2023If you've read Kafka The Metamorphosis, you should have an idea of the ride you're about to embark. But rather than taking a bleak modern route, the author took a completely absurd fantasy one.
You are Monty, of Larp and Monty, a guard guarding a Tower-of-Sauron-like tower, but something went wrong. And then, Larp becomes weird. And then, it's your turn. And now, what?
Well, this becomes a bit of running around to get to safety then deciding that to do and where to go because of "the metamorphoses". Do you go back to where you came from, hoping things will get back to normal, or accept this new state? Very kafka-esque.
Even if the medium it was based on is relatively dark, the game is much lighter, pushing the humorous aspect in the banter between the two characters or the descriptions and narration. It is a delight.
Small note: after some choices, the page will refresh to add the new text, but scroll all the way down the page rather than staying at the top. As most bit are sizeable, you will have to scroll back up quite often
Blink, don't blink, oh no you blinked at the wrong time!, November 4, 2023This game had a very creative take on the blinking theme, using the player actually blinking to affect the gameplay, via your webcam and facial recognition. While this is super cool and innovative, fast blinkers like me might have a tough time completing a room before the environment is changed. Luckily, the devs included a non-webcam alternative: pressing your spacebar to "pretend" blinking (though you may lose a bit of the immersion/change, unless you blink at the same time).
With this mechanic, you are given a series of puzzle to complete to escape the labyrinth, where the solution often requires you to "blink" to change the environment, so you can get a key inside a block of ice (but now it's melted) or insert it in a keyhole (which didn't fit at first, because it was the wrong door)... The scenarios are quite diverse, so the mechanic never really loses it charm.
However, while the ambiance is heightened by the funky tunes and the animated background*, these soon became distracting (the way the animation moved made me pretty sick, so I couldn't finish the game).
*the author have commented if they update the game, a toggle for animation will be on the list.
Great fun game, with a very cool mechanic. Worth a try at least!
Take a plunge..., November 4, 2023To take on the theme of the jam, the game mixes sci-fi and fantastical elements, which fit pretty well together, giving an eerie feel to Tsumugi environment and state of mind. Through the many early endings, the story pushes you to explore the strange happenstance.
At times, the game seems a tad unfinished and unpolished, which the author can be forgiven for, as it was completed in less than a day. There seems to be achievements and stats aspect in the game, which you are notified when picking certain choices. However, it is unclear how much this affect the story, aside from direct variation (or running into an abrupt ending).
There is something quite interesting to the setting, and how you get to the fantastical element, but it doesn't feel pushed enough or like elements were introduced but abandoned half-way through. It would be interesting to see more of the RP/state play a role further into the story.
One final bit: the illustration on the game page/title card is really lovely!
... or not!, November 4, 2023Told in three parts, with a change in POV in between, the story mashes Christian mythos and horror, through the arrival of the apocalypse. As such, it takes an interesting approach on the theme, by going to the earliest use of the phrase in the blink of an eye, Through this the re-contextualisation of religious themes inside a horror framing, the game discusses religion and faith, change (or lack thereof), and what happens after death.
The writing, being quite flowery and evocative, tries to emulate old English to set the story in late Ancient Times - though only for spoken words, the rest of the text using modern prose. I found it a bit jarring, as little of the setting is framed from being in this time.
Finally, the ambiguous and unchanging ending left me unsatisfied. Your choices, which are recapped at the end, are supposed to give you an answer to why the ending is the way it is, or at least lead you towards your own interpretation. But I don't feel like it quite worked, for any choice I made. I didn't understand why only one of the two, even if both are in this situation, finds solace at the end...
I think quite a bit of the story stands on a prerequisite knowledge of Christian mythos, and assumes that the players has those, to make enough of an impact.
Take a break and watch the forest change., November 4, 2023This was a very cute entry to the inkJam, one of the most sweet and serene of all of them, as you watch a forest going through the different seasons and stages, as its inhabitants change*, adapting to the environment. I am still not sure if you are the forest or another wordly being, but frankly it matters little here.
*in a blink of an eye, get it?
Like the story, the writing is fairly mellow and calm. Depending on the choice you make, you can manage to loop back to the start, and try out a different branch (watching more closely or close your eyes and vibe).
The illustrations, both in the backgrounds (which change with the theme!) and as headers for each "chapter", were quite lovely, adding to the serenity of the story. It was just a shame they wouldn't fit properly one the page...
Chill cute vibes.
Can't not blink..., November 3, 2023This is a tiny horror story about what is and isn't around you, but also not quite. It does not just play with your senses of what you see and feel, but also with your agency as a player.
While it should add to the uneasiness of the setting, it didn't work for me. This felt more like something you'd fin in r/twosentenceshorror.
To mod or not to mod..., November 3, 2023This was a bit of a mind-blowing game. It takes an intriguing take on the themes of agency, control over and expression of one's body, body modification and technological advancement.
The use of an interview mechanic to prove the customer's motivation for a procedure is done quite well, with realistic reactions from them when your probing goes towards an unexpected path or pushes too much. Depending on the tone chosen at the start, you will find subtle variations in the responses. At the end, you will have to choose whether you approve of the procedure or advise against.
It is both uneasy to go through, hard to look away, and pretty well done.
Should I stay or should I go?, November 3, 2023This game had a very interesting sci-fi premise with the whole end of the Universe/of life concept and last effort for hope, clashing with a more blasé outlook of living for the moment while you can, because humanity is doomed anyway. Though it is set in a far future, with a probably impossible setting, the tech doesn't feel too far-fetched and complicated to grasp.
The fast pace start hooks pretty quickly, feeling that anxiety and weight of the importance of the mission. It slows down from the middle point, where you get more concrete exposition* and a sense of dread from the state of your ship and the crew. This culminates to the big choice: continue your mission or give up.
*More lore is available on the game page, as a feelies (downloadable extra).
This was a quirky prototype that ends pretty abruptly (depending on the path taken, pretty quickly too). It is very humoristic, and very chaotic energy vibe: the pets are not your run-of-the-mill cats and dogs, and you might not be able to handle them...
Adding to the chaotic vibe are the illustration, with its funky style. It's a shame the current version is so short (though understandable due to the limitations). So I hope a longer version comes out at some point, and have more shenanigans to handle with those weird pets.
In the meantime, I'm bringing the pets back...
Hope you do well on yout first mission!, November 3, 2023This had huge Aliens/Predator vibes, from the setting of the story to the beasts' descriptions. The whole moving about in the building did remind me a bit of Ripley going through the ship to hunt down the Alien. The gameplay itself is pretty simple: you mainly get binary choices, with some leading you to an early end (being sneaky is not always the smart choice...).
Trying to stay alive, balance your ammos, and keeping everyone sage is trickier than it seemed, but it makes for a fun small adventure/dungeon game.
Buy a planet, watch it grow and die. Don't blink!, November 3, 2023This game has a cool sci-fi concept, where you get to see how a planet transforms before your eyes at lightning speed, before getting small snapshots of different elements. It's pretty eerie, seeing life being reduced to numbers and snapshots for your own enjoyment (and yours alone). I am still not sure whether the generated planet is supposed to be "real" or lines of code in a computer, but the implications either way are a bit creepy.
The planets and its components are also randomly generated, making replays pretty fun (though I was unlucky the first few times). I also liked the simple and muted animated background, giving off that futuristic-corporate vibe that fits with the setting.
It was a neat experiment.
What you see in those last moments, November 3, 2023This entry had an interesting use of the theme, with a collection of snippets of his life flashes before him, as Stan is about to die. The writing is quite nice, and flows pretty well from one snippet to another (what'd you'd expect in that kind of situation). Stan struggles with a lot of things in his life, especially his family breaking apart following his divorce due to his actions, and I thought the writing did a pretty good job representing this. The final beat of the game had me chocking up.
However, I wasn't fan of the Interface (you need to open the game in full screen to play). The white text is often really difficult to read against the bright background (can't be changed) and the font size changes depending on the amount of text. The way the interactivity is set up (having to click Continue at the bottom then go to the top of the page for the option) becomes a bit annoying. There is also barely any coherence in the style of the different backgrounds (AI generated), with the characters represented looking like completely different people from one screen to another.
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