Reviews by Esperbucket

The guests are almost here, and the master is in one of his moods. You're his faithful servant, and there's much to do: a cook to fire, candles to light, and a special harness to locate, to say nothing of what you'll need to do once the party actually starts. It's enough to make anyone go... batty.

The Bat is, to date, one of the best things I've read this year, and it's no surprise given that this is a Chandler Groover production. I recently reread Toby's Nose to see if it still held up to my impression of it, and it did - but what Groover has achieved here has eclipsed it.

The limited nature of the parser and inventory didn't faze me - on the contrary, it only served to heighten the experience; even a talented valet has only two hands, of course, and attending to things is in their nature. The charm and personality in the writing is ever-present and never falters, each room and strange object and wacky goings-on described in just as much detail that it needs to be. I don't think I quite got all the clever references - there certainly are a lot of them - but they by no means overstay their welcome.

One mechanic in particular stands out, as has been mentioned in other reviews, and whether it was intended as genre commentary or not, it was bloody good fun to solve puzzles with.

Just outstanding work all round, really. Five experimental bats out of five.

The camel's back is broken, the end of the rope has been reached. "Get thee to a nunnery" is an idea that has reached its time, at least in the mind of the angry little clergyman who had it. Unfortunately for him, the subject of the idea is not going to go quietly...

No More is a compact experience that is packed full of personality and detail, and even though it plays out in a single room - the inside of a carriage - the description of it changes as the story unfolds and the situation becomes a bit more clear.

I appreciated the option of having a story mode, and although I would have liked more interactivity or variability in the ending, it plays out very well and is, on the whole, a satisfying little read. Four beams of moonlight out of five.

As a Word Mage, the English language is both the source of your magical power and your instrument. However, a really badly timed accident has not only robbed you of your ability to use verbs, but put you in a sticky situation involving a pissed-off dragon. Maybe you can find another word class to bend to your will? Although, it's not going to be easy...

Nonverbal Communication is a little gem of an experience with a fantastic mechanic at its heart. As other reviews mention, it seems like that this is intended to be a proof-of-concept for a larger piece of fiction - and if it isn't, it really should be.

I did find it very difficult to understand at first, and I think more could have been done to make the mechanic a little clearer in the beginning, but after a significant trial and error period, I was able to get to an ending, and from there work my way into solving the path to get the others. The overarching story between wizard and dragon was delivered well and it connected with me, but it could have been extended and fleshed out just a little bit more.

Well, I really want more of everything this is. Please! Four rampaging dragons out of five.

"If you are cold, tea will warm you; if you are too heated, it will cool you; if you are depressed, it will cheer you; if you are excited, it will calm you."
- British Prime Minister William E. Gladstone (allegedly)

Like the titular sentimental feeling the protagonist expresses towards the titular teacup, the words of praise in this review will be minor. However, Quest for the Teacup of Minor Sentimental Value did reveal to me a number of things that I had not been aware of (due to my long absence from the scene), including that you can run RPGMaker games in the browser now. Huh. I shall file that one away for later.

I did enjoy the work, and I thought a lot of the comedy was clever. Some slightly missed the mark, but overall the idea of (Spoiler - click to show)tracking down, confronting and eventually overcoming Actual, Literal Satan - to retrieve a teacup you don't even particularly care for that badly - is good, and worth the short playtime.

There are a handful of choices here and there and a few bad ends, with only a couple of them being particularly memorable, so it's not quite as interactive as I'd hoped for. There is combat, but as far as I can tell that's just for a bit of flavor in certain circumstances.

All in all, a moderately entertaining experience. Three Portals to Hell out of five.

You are a familiar - a homunculus, a little man in the bottle - except you're not gendered, not at all human, and definitely not in a bottle. You've just been created, and aware of your own existence. But you are alone, and your creator is nowhere to be seen. Luckily, you have a special ability - to synthesize yourself with every other familiar you come across to take THEIR special abilities. Your goal? Escape the facility you were born in and take vengeance on your indifferent master!

Familiar Problems is a great little game that positively vibrates (RESONATES, even) with personality, every detail of the world it is set in placed there with purpose and care. Once the mechanics of your powers are worked out, the way you use them to solve the various puzzles in the facility becomes clear, though it may take a little while. There is a helpful ASCII map at the top to aid with navigation but, uh, I kind of only noticed it about two-thirds of the way through, haha.

This ticked all of my boxes, and I will definitely check out the other Stelzer works in time. My only real complaint is the length, and I hope there's a sequel or two in the pipeline, because this mechanic has legs (spindly compass ones, of course). Five blobs of bluish-green fluid out of five.

Would you let someone else borrow your own body? Take it out for a spin, have a joyride with your physicality for a short period of time, see if the grass is really all that green on the other side.

Let's say that if you did, then... what if the joyrider decided to stick around longer than originally agreed upon? What if your body, your life, was much more enjoyable than whatever they had to go back to?

What if you were taken over?

do not let your left hand know not only explores this idea but savors it, twists it and weaves a narrative through it and around it that is emotional and confronting. It definitely got a reaction out of me, and it is incredibly well-written, not just in terms of the actual text but how it is positioned and arranged, something that is easy to miss at first glance but becomes very obvious by the end.

When time came for the single choice to be made, it was clear which option would lead to its corresponding outcome, and I was able to get the conclusion that satisfied me the most.

I only wish I was able to give more than four stars, but single-choice narratives like this don't really fulfil my criterion about interactivity. All others were satisfied, and I want to read more from this author.

Overall, a pleasant twenty minute reading experience. Four pairs of hearts out of five.

You are in an awful future, that much is plain. Words writhe and crawl along the screen at your touch, transforming from one language to another and back again as you try and divine their meaning. You are a conduit for something greater, something you do not understand, but which nevertheless has such a hold on you and the world you live in that reality, and your memories of it, are forever compromised.

This is Verses, and it is one hell of a trip.

I'm just going to come out and say it - I don't think I understood the story fully, or whether or not I am meant to understand it, which is why this is a four-star review and not a five. However, the impression I was able to get is that Verses is an incredibly atmospheric work that (ironically, as it turns out) needs time to digest.

The world it describes is full of decay, ruin and visceral imagery, and as a journeyman linguist I appreciate the little flourishes of translation present - at various points you're directed to translate something which appears in Romanian and then, as you click, it gradually transforms from that to a literal English translation and then a more thematically accurate (or more poetic) interpretation of that.

The religious symbolism laid throughout is thick and purposeful, and there are multiple ways this manifests in the environment and plot. It's a kind of writing that seems to live and breathe and die and rot just like the fleshy masses and biological protuberances it describes.

Overall, a thoroughly enjoyable yet unsettling experience, and I hope to read more from this particular author. Four sebaceous glands out of five.

The description of Superluminal Vagrant Twin announces itself as a "shallow but broad" exploration game, and I heartily disagree. Sometimes, less is more, and that is no more apparent than in the text of this brilliant piece of interactive fiction.

You're a space captain on a mission to make enough money to get back what you've lost, and you've got to visit a score or two of weird and wonderful planets to do it. Each world is given a brief description, every character on their surface sketched out in a sentence.

But it's that brevity that lights a fire in the hearth of imagination, each detail latched on to, recorded and remembered and treasured because it's those little details that offer clues on how to proceed and how to get to the next destination.
As each location is reached, more of the setting is revealed - not so much that it feels like exposition, but enough to give you an idea about who inhabits this place, what goes on in it, and what you can do here.

Eventually, your goal will be in reach, but you'll soon discover that maybe there's more to do out there than you realized.

A remarkable piece of writing that deserves more eyes on it, like a lot of IF works out there. Five amalg dreadnoughts out of five.

With no memory of who you are or what you are doing there, you have found yourself in a bleak stone chamber with only one exit. Clambering out and up a staircase, the breath catches in your throat as you realize where you are - a dreamhold, the private home and study of an immortal wizard. Your only goal would appear to be escape - but why are you drawn to collecting strange masks? Either way, you must explore this place, and all of the magical mystery within.

The Dreamhold was designed as an introductory story to parser IF, and as a result you are guided by the Voice, who uses italicized brackets to give advice, hints, and occasionally self-deprecating commentary:

[Amnesia. Yes, it's a cliché, but it'll do for a tutorial.]

There is an expert mode for those readers that enjoy fiendish puzzles (I'm not quite prepared for that yet!), and I like the idea that once-IF newbies, after playing through it the first time and then many other IF games, tackling that challenge as a final exam of sorts. I did enjoy solving the mystery on normal, and the dreamhold was brilliantly designed and well-crafted.

However, the reason why I've not given it a full score is that I did not quite understand the story or the couple of endings that I managed to find, and perhaps there could have been a clearer backstory or some sort of helpful coda or explainer at the end. Perhaps I was just being particularly obtuse, and perhaps one day I'll amend it if I do complete expert mode and that illuminates things.

Nonetheless this game does exactly what it sets out to do, which is provide a great introduction to parsers. Four multicoloured masks - in any order, I'm not picky (unlike some!).

A man has been murdered, and Sherlock Holmes is on the case. The police have been summoned, the suspects have been assembled, and Watson is taking notes. All that's left is for the dog to bark at the culprit. Wait, what?

As a die-hard Sherlock Holmes fan, I was immediately drawn to the premise, and once I got my hands on it I was not disappointed. Toby's Nose is an absolutely gorgeous game, and the writing is as authentic and enthralling as possible.

You are Toby, the dog with the famous nose, and it's your job to smell out the killer - there's a treat in it for you. Indeed, that's quite literally how you do it - but as a dog, your sense of smell transcends time and space, one smell opening up avenues and possibilities and other smells. The descriptions are marvelously deep and often entertaining - I was blown away by how immersive it all was, and how the breadcrumbs were laid to draw you into a final conclusion about what happened.

I read Toby's Nose directly after Lime Ergot, and as the author mentions in his note, the non-traditional method of exploration and the concept of layered descriptions is very similar, but cleverly implemented and explained so as to be unique enough. I love the concept of a dog's smelling ability - or maybe just Toby's - being so acute that it can detect smells within smells and therefore describe times and places and events without having to actually go there.

Toby's Nose is a true gem, and as a fan of Holmes and murder mysteries it really impressed me. Five cheese crumpets.