Reviews by cgasquid

You have a surreal world based on an academic subject, with the protagonist being a practitioner of that academic field who seems to have forgotten everything until after they've solved the relevant puzzle. Aside from the weird locations and situations, there are also famous geniuses in the field hanging around to be interacted with, including the Greek hero Achilles (as seen in one of Zeno's paradoxes).

The description above describes both The Chinese Room and A Beauty Cold and Austere. Half of the description also applies to Dr. Dumont's Wild PARTI. The main difference is that while the latter two games apply to the hard sciences (mathematics and physics, respectively) while the former applies to philosophy.

The secondary difference is that the latter two games actually work. I don't mean "work as a game," although that's true as well -- The Chinese Room is incredibly buggy and insufficiently implemented.

You have a ludicrously small inventory limit for no particular reason. You have a container, and objects are shifted in and out of it when you use them as expected. Three specific objects, though, can be put into the sack -- including automatically -- and can't be removed. In two of the three cases that's an instant no-win situation.

"Light lantern with lighter" works, but not "light lantern". The qualiascope requires very specific syntax and functions inconsistently. Certain conversational options not only don't work, but show a parser error message. There are typos throughout, in a few places actually making the meaning of sentences ambiguous. Most of the nouns in the text are unimplemented, in some cases bafflingly so ("trees" is implemented but not "tree"?) Objects are obtained by solving a puzzle, used once, and discarded; the puzzles are strictly one-per-room and the game only contains two rooms without a puzzle in them.

Most of all, though, is the handling of the subject matter. A few puzzles are actually solved through application of philosophy, but more of them seem to be jokes. In a couple of cases actual philosophical dilemmas are given pat, "correct" answers. While it's not uncommon for games in the genre to just randomly dump historical figures into a room, The Chinese Room may be setting a record for useless cameos.

The tertiary difference is that the two better games are both fairly po-faced; the situations are often funny but they aren't wacky. Whether this is good or bad is up to you.

Overall this game has a lot of potential; the writing positively sparkles and there are some great moments. But there's just this feeling that the whole thing is .. rushed.

Note: This is the only game I think I've played where the player character is firmly established as bi.

Clever bit of dry, political British humor. You encounter Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn on the street and have to keep him from joining a terrorist organization. I can't help but feel this was probably more topical when it was created.

Still, it's not bad per se. It's brief, it's more of a CYOA than actual interactive fiction, and there's nothing literary about it. But it's worth a few chuckles and trying for a few different endings.

the one-move game Aisle has been endlessly remixed, parodied, copied, and reiterated at this point. most of the copies have ignored the pathos that was the original's intent, instead focusing on the bizarre responses the original provided for more out-there commands that seemed to hint that the protagonist was suffering from dementia.

in this offering, you are sitting at a restaurant table with your lover, and you intend to leave them. you have one move. every response the parser recognizes will print out a joke interpretation of what you typed as a method of dumping said lover.

the key here is "every response the parser recognizes." most of the things i typed after the obvious were not understood. objects whose presence had been established in one narrative were not implemented, and couldn't be interacted with in the next restart.

it's not that this kind of game can't be done well, though admittedly i can only think of two times it worked: Rematch and I'm Having a Heart Attack from the Apollo 13 collection. in both cases the implementation was extremely deep, and you could (and needed to) build on what you learn about the setting from your previous actions to give you ideas for later attempts.

here i ran into too many brick walls of unimplemented words and lost interest.

you are a college student (male by default, though it switches to female if you type (Spoiler - click to show)HETERONORMATIVITY OFF, something i'd give my left arm to be able to do in real life). you've been making practically no progress on your paper because you keep allowing yourself to be distracted, and your girlfriend is fed up with you. now you have an ultimatum: write 1,000 words by the deadline or she's leaving you forever.

as a point of stark realism, your college dorm room turns out to be a horrible place to study. there's no quiet, you're surrounded by minor irritants, and there's a MAJOR irritant who i'd think was trying to sabotage your relationship if there was any way she could know about the ultimatum.

in a very clever design choice, rather than being personality-free (or pointlessly sarcastic like the default library), the parser's voice is what you imagine your girlfriend would be saying if she was watching your situation right at that moment. it gives her a lot of character, and goes a long way towards redeeming her in my eyes (really, it's not fair to issue an ultimatum about something the protagonist can't really help).

that said, i did not even come close to completing the story without hints.

the puzzles in Violet are eminently logical, but still entirely brutal and require a ton of experimentation. so many things are happening at once that it can distract the player, as your problems aren't kindly enough to line up one at a time. the few means you have to fight back are counterintuitive and in some cases plain ornery (e.g., (Spoiler - click to show)the bizarre way you operate the radio).

but "it's hard" doesn't equate to "it's bad." we need IF for all levels of player skill and creativity. the only reason i don't refer to this as a hidden gem is that it's not at all hidden -- it's extremely well-known.

probably also says something that i was feeling depressed after writing a few negative reviews in a row, i wanted to review something good, and i came here ...

SCREW YOU, BEAR DAD is a pun-filled jape, full of jokes, slapstick, and a small amount of interactivity. there's no branching storyline, no puzzles, and no deeper meaning; you start the story by crashing through the skylight and landing in a remote, isolated (Spoiler - click to show)toy factory. the story is divided between your experiences as a bear and the antics of the factory's dysfunctional crew. this part of the story is hilarious.

SCREW YOU, BEAR DAD is a very serious exploration of the relationship between a son and his abusive father. it begins with a more recent memory of the father's inability to understand or relate to his son as an adult, but later goes on to a childhood memory where the father has a completely inappropriate reaction to (Spoiler - click to show)his son going missing in the woods and almost drowning. this part of the story is emotional and deadly serious, and shows how things between the two of them got so bad.

i have no idea how these two stories can coexist in the same place, but somehow it works. it feels sort of like the main story is the comic relief for the flashbacks, showing that the son grew up okay after all, even if his choices landed him in a ridiculous and dangerous situation.