Reviews by SkyShard

I enjoyed the tactile feeling of Something In Our Heart. I think that all of the different user interfaces felt really creative. There are so many things to scroll through and the method of proceeding is never quite the same. This peaks somewhere near the beginning of the story, shortly after Res uploads itself, where familiar the structure of a forum contrasts with the bizarre non-conformity of Res' new digital world. There's a lot of poetry throughout this work that I enjoyed. My favorite pieces tended to lean into a digital game-y quality. There are poems here that I think are only possible in Decker and I find those fascinating.

The structure of Something In Our Heart works the best when it's able to balance the poetic oddness of the digital world with the familiar melodrama of the forum. The commentary of the forum users is funny and provides a more parse-able overview of what Res is going through in the other parts of the story. Somewhere near the middle of the work, however, the forum posts stop and we're left with Res' commentary as another character is introduced in the digital space. This is where things started to get harder for me to follow, which I find unfortunate since this is also where the themes of the work started to grab my attention more.

Somewhere near the start of reading Lilac Song I was reminded of the novel The Remains of the Day, which I find to be an interesting and helpful point of comparison. Where Stephens takes every opportunity to distinguish himself, in his position as a butler, from Lord Darlington, the relationship between Otto and Sibylle has a more parent-like quality to it, perhaps best represented by Otto calling Sibylle his child, at one point. Sibylle is hopeful and imaginative, qualities which occasionally bring her into conflict with Otto, even if Sibylle harbors too much respect for the man to argue much.

I found this relationship to be profound and well portrayed. There are lots of fine details in here that complicate the narrative beyond a dichotomy of two similar stereotypes, one which portrays the young rebellious thinker as childlike and naive and another which portrays an old powerful man as out of touch with modern political realities. This is not to say that Lilac Song does not have a point of view on these politics. The world portrayed here is one that is preciously aware of time and its consequences, one that contends with the value of recognizing the past while imagining the future. I would hope to live in a world where Sibylle keeps working on her game, where it's possible to map out the path to a brighter future.

Oxblood is split into two sections, narrative passages focusing on Ethel's point of view, and a series of detours that (usually) lay out the specific rules of vampiricism in this world. Interestingly, the narrative passages are told with a third person point of view while the detours are told in the first person from a tongue-and-cheek narrator.

In truth, the detours did not do much for me. The vampires in Oxblood did not, in my view, need much explanation beyond the narrative itself, and the narrator's voice was not strong enough to carry some of these passages. I think the below passage is a good example of bad tendencies throughout some of the detours as the narrator explains the genre-typical notion that vampires like to live in spooky spaces:

Check local urban legends for places which are “haunted” or “cursed” — that’s the spot. If a human somehow walks in, well, you can bite and get them out, and they probably won’t remember. What? Aren’t we scared of the cops being called? Don’t make us laugh. You think cops can do anything at all?

By contrast, I found the writing in the narrative sections to be wonderfully evocative. There was a variety and depth to the characters and their experiences. The language of the closing to the story in particular was vivid and had the stylistic restraint I was missing from the other sections.

The highlight of my baby needs blood is in its presentation. I appreciate the care and attention that went into composing the shots of the trees and the text. The harshness of the posterization effect combined with the waviness of everything on screen is really satisfying to look at. The visuals go through a number of subtle shifts as well as the time of day and weather changes over the course of the story. There are a number of other choices that I really think bring out the author's eye for design, like the use of de-saturated blues in place of a pure white/black. The audio is similarly immersive and well done.

Some scenes have a very subtle (perhaps too subtle?) crosshair that can be moved around, as if you're aiming at something. I think this was supposed to reflect the hunt the protagonist is going on, but to my knowledge the game seems ambivalent towards what the player looks at so long as they click anywhere to proceed.

The main feeling I have after finishing is excitement to see what the author does next.

The writing of The Warren is consistent and evocative. I would recommend it for those who enjoy fairy-tales and stories centering around animal societies.

Note that this review will discuss both games in the Car 13, Seat 26 project.

If you squint, “the train will pass you by” and “she came from the fog” are decidedly similar. While told from different perspectives, each is about a character who, for a brief moment, is able to consider a world that is different from their own. In the former story a first person narrator longs for the escape of a nearby train. This train comes close to the narrator, but it never stops. In the latter story second person narration describes something resembling a romantic encounter that is doomed to last. In short, both stories are about a temporary escapism. I must admit that I find myself partial to the approach “she came from the fog” takes to telling this narrative. While the details of she who came from the fog are bizarre and impossible, the drama following two intimate characters with misaligned intentions provides a compelling narrative grounding to the rest of the story.

Both pieces are short and present interesting ideas. It is only after stating this that I feel comfortable noting that I wished some of these ideas could have been developed further. I find the general sentiment expressed in “the train will pass you by” relatable, but I’m unsure as to whether that’s a good thing for the work. The relative sparseness of concrete details about the village and about what is holding the main character back cause these experiences to feel oddly universal as opposed to feeling specific, but this may just be a consequence of the piece’s short length.

There is a common saying from the past several years that goes something like: "Be careful about what you post online as it will stay there forever." This saying is nonsense for two reasons. First, anything that exists online is subject to being wiped and forgotten at any point, no exceptions. Second, even if you don't or can't go online, some part of you will likely end up there anyway. The things we want to stay will cease to exist while our own simulacra march onward, usually without our knowledge. This is the world The Stormville Sweep was born into.

The Stormville Sweep is a short (1-2 hour) puzzle game built entirely using a Google Maps feature that allows users to highlight and write descriptions for waypoints on a map. Here, ~20 locations in the titular hamlet have been selected to contain a clue pointing to another location on the map. Along with each clue is a letter which spell out a secret message when placed in order. The process of deciphering clues varies between each location. Some clues involve piecing together cartographic information about the locations themselves, while others involve knowledge about the inhabitants of Stormville. Many of the games' riddles combine both approaches. I found the former cartographic riddles to be more straightforward since the game interface is a mapping tool. Clues involving the inhabitants of Stormville will likely require performing outside research to learn about who was related to who, and in what ways.

Despite the game being built on Google Maps, I think this is the most interesting thing The Stormville Sweep does. Through the use of real people and places, The Stormville Sweep begins to form something resembling a narrative. This narrative has half of a setting: there are places, but there is no definite time. While the riddles and clues the gameplay is based on tend to deal with people and events from the 19th and 20th centuries, the map of Stormville is a modern one: there is a Tim Hortons less than a mile away. Some of the clues even reference the discrepancies between the Stormville of the past, and the Stormville of the present.

In the same way that there is an almost-setting, there are also almost-characters: the people who used to live in Stormville. While playing, you will necessarily learn little bits of information about these people, but you can never form a complete picture of any one of them. Trying to do so goes beyond the bounds of what the game asks of you while also getting progressively more difficult the deeper you go, such is the way of history. I found the research I did over my play session into these people to be mostly pleasant, although it did bring up some strange questions for me about the function of online family history archives. Who compiles the information on these sites? Why? For whom?

I do not know for how long The Stormville Sweep will be playable, at least in its current state. Google could delete the specific Google Maps features used to make this game (it has been known to happen), the map itself could be updated, and sooner or later the world will also change. The people of Stormville might be lost or become tucked away behind a paywall or a physical trip to a library. I do not know which will give first, but at least for now I can say that Stormville Sweep is pretty fun.

After my my first hour with LLLLL, I became convinced that this was one of the most special stories I had read in quite a while. A few hours later, after finishing LLLLL, I had trouble reconciling my earlier opinions about the game with the indifference I felt after finishing. Had I played a brilliant game that took a few stumbles, or a boring one that managed to pull off some genuinely incredible moments?

My highest compliments go to the visuals of LLLLL and to a certain enthralling character to the writing that is especially prominent early on in the story. There were a handful of very cleverly done moments where I was amazed at what the narrative was able to pull off. At one point I was so invested in what was happening that I had to take a ten minute breather to compose myself before continuing. Unfortunately, I do not think this quality of the writing was able to cover for some larger underlying issues I had with the story.

LLLLL, in my view, bills itself as a game about messy characters in messy situations. A scene-by-scene analysis of what happens would probably show this to be true. It's somewhat confounding to me then how this ethos never extends to the characters in the narrative, who felt flat. The main character, L, and their eventual love interest, were depicted in such a way that left me wondering if they had ever done anything wrong in their lives (no, awkward social interactions and poorly thought out decisions do not count). Conversely, the antagonists act cartoonishly awful in almost every circumstance.

In most stories, I think this would be boring, but these aspects of the characters interact with the subject matter of the narrative in ways that I found unpleasant. When almost everyone in LLLLL is neurodivergent and/or has mental health struggles, the black-and-white treatment of many characters felt like it reinforced a number of negative views about the aforementioned groups of people. Some symptoms/behaviors of the characters (specifically, of L) were presented as being relatable or at least worthy of sympathy, whereas other behaviors were presented as being inherently unreasonable, or even cruel. My own distaste for this aside, I do not believe this was a particularly interesting or novel way of approaching the subject.

These kinds of issues became more pronounced to me as the story progressed into its final hour or so. Despite this, LLLLL still has many interesting ideas and some genuinely great moments, even if I think some of them were muddled by the kinds of issues I mentioned above. If you're willing to meet it halfway through some awkwardness in the characterizations and pacing, I think LLLLL has something interesting and worthwhile to engage with.