Ratings and Reviews by Lance Cirone

Jupiter's forcing you to set up a party for Chuck D. Schmendiman, a man entering the pantheon for his newfound immortality. To get supplies for his party, you trade four delicious fruit pies (which, disappointingly, give a "plainly inedible" default response if you try to eat one) to the Greek gods spread around.

This is a Speed IF, so there's not a lot of gameplay or puzzles here, but I liked the atmosphere. All of the gods are practicing different activities and have amusing personalities. I particularly liked Mars looking just like the planet Mars instead of a god. And the ending is silly, but I wouldn't have wanted anything else from this game. A quick play, but worth it.

Speculative Fiction's voice and narration are full of personality. Everything is written from the perspective of wizard-turned-bird W.D., whether he's reflecting upon his past failed inventions or trying to cheat his way into wealth. The NPCs and characters around the world are interesting, and I had so much fun on my initial run through the world just to see what there was.

Eventually, it came down to the part where I had to start puzzle-solving, and this is where the game started to grate on me. There's very few clues, and while I was able to solve two or three on my own, I spent a lot of time struggling with ones that I didn't have the necessary materials for. I think I had a bug with the (Spoiler - click to show)cabinet puzzle, and the blind man's puzzle wouldn't accept some of the other solutions I thought were sensible. Other stuff, like the (Spoiler - click to show)stock market and fishing chalk circle, are practically begging for you to look at the walkthrough.

I'd recommend giving this game a quick look to appreciate the unique style, but don't be afraid to look for hints if you're intent on solving it.

Max Blaster is a game with engaging writing and an active, fast-paced story. The characters are memorable and the game's humor is on-point; I always loved reading the footnotes. The mechanic of being able to switch between the two heroes, and use their unique gadgets, led to some fun puzzles.

However, the game's biggest problem is the bugs. The parser is unresponsive, no matter how many different ways you word your commands or how simple they should be. I triggered a bug that made the game permanently unwinnable midway through in the computer room, the sandwich puzzle did not respond no matter how closely I followed the walkthrough, and figuring out Max's barrier tool was such a pain that I stuck to Doris until I was forced to use it.

If you're willing to put up with an unpolished gameplay experience, give Max Blaster a try, because the written content here is very much worth it.

(Adapted from an intfiction.org post)

For a Change has a dreamlike quality to it. All of its unusual logic comes together and really makes sense, ending up with a truly unforgettable experience. The game’s language is succinct and yet very descriptive: one line in particular that impressed me was The sun beats overhead, lending brightness and warmth, both long distant from the land you know. Items you find are strange, such as a “handlefish” or an “anchisel”, which are minimally described beyond some key traits about their demeanor. The game gives you a lot of time and material to immerse yourself in the world and try to visualize what you’re really dealing with. It wound up feeling rewarding to even figure out what an item or technique was, and then how to use it.

The key plot of For a Change is that you have to figure out how to bring the Sun back to your small land, which is overcast by a long wall. Beings in the meantime have figured out how to adapt to life in the shade. A major mechanic involves a small model replica of your land, closed off by a glass case. Your interactions and what you do to the world will end up making the true concept of the game more obvious. The climax in particular felt really satisfying.

For a Change is a short game (should only take around two hours, give or take a half, on a blind run), so it’s easy to recommend for a quick-yet-high quality experience. I kept the review light on spoiler details because I think it's fun to figure out on your own. It’s not that hard and it has an optional built-in hint system, plus there's no way to make it unwinnable. Give it a try.

(Adapted from an intfiction.org post)

You are Douglas Reilly, a detective for hire. One day, you receive a notice from the Baron: his daughter, Lisa von Bulow, has run away with a no-good scumbag named Erik McAllister. It’s up to you and your trusty servant Wesson to find Lisa, ensure her safety, and maybe even convince her that she can do better. And so begins PataNoir!

PataNoir's main appeal is that it’s based on similes. Places you explore will be littered with descriptions that mention similes: hard like a brick, cold like ice, sharp as a knife. And it’s up to you to figure out what to do with that brick, ice, and knife. The few real-world objects you collect usually cannot be combined with the simile items, but you can apply them to people, such as putting marble on someone’s face to make them unexpressive. You also have a servant, Wesson, and you’ll need his help to accomplish some tasks. Otherwise, you can ask him for a nudge in the right direction. He’s basically the game’s hint system, and I found this helpful and unobtrusive.

There’s some elements to PataNoir that didn’t feel quite right. For one, the parser is simplified so that you can just type an object’s name to interact with it, or “[object 1] [object 2]” to apply something to something else. I realize this might have been done to help people more unfamiliar with IF, but it wouldn’t always give me the right action I wanted by default. I found the interactions between the real world and the simile objects kind of inconsistent – I initially assumed it was a clear-cut “theoretical objects can’t affect real world ones”, but there’s multiple puzzles that go against this, despite the game telling you otherwise. There’s also numerous puzzles or items that didn’t go anywhere: what was I supposed to do with the (Spoiler - click to show)angry giant, trumpet statue, or old knight and mummies? There’s no real distinction between something that’s just there for silly flavor text or an integral part of a puzzle. It got a little confusing, but thankfully, Wesson can tell you if you still need to do anything in the room.

I thought the characters and story in this game were simple, but strong. Douglas is a straight-laced detective who never wants his work to get personal, but respects his rules and guidelines. His dialogue with others isn’t mind-blowing, but it gives him some nice character. Throughout the game, you’ll visit classic noir locales such as a casino, a dirty apartment, and a dingy bar. The plot has a few twists and turns, and it kept me engaged and wanting to play more. There’s even a bonus scene you can get before the ending if you solve an optional endgame puzzle, which I was satisfied with. I was a bit split on how I felt about the very last scene, though, which shows up no matter which ending you get before; (Spoiler - click to show)I found it a bit depressing at first, but I realize it was foreshadowed well and ultimately doesn’t nullify everything you’ve done.

Ultimately, I had fun with PataNoir. It never gets too frustrating, there’s no game-breaking bugs and very few chances to get a game over, and the idea of being able to use similes to your advantage is creative and executed well. This isn’t one of my favorite IF games, but it captures the genre well, and it’s a good time if you want something light.

Dinner Bell is a one-room game full of silly humor. Your goal is, from inside your test chamber, to find 16 food items. You instinctively put them in a grocery bag, despite starving, due to the conditioning from Dr. Beagle.

In Dinner Bell, it's worth trying some weird or silly stuff to see what it has to say. My favorite joke involved either the bucket of wax pears, or the Shiptogar. The game's theming is also pretty interesting and unique, and I haven't seen anything else like it.

It's a quick game, but there's a lot to like here. I recommend it.

The Mary Jane of Tomorrow has a cute, low-stakes story with a really creative core mechanic: procedurally generated text. You're training a robot called the Pine Nut Queen, and it learns from various books and texts you feed it from around the house. Its dialogue and responses change according depending on what it has learned. Your main goal is to make sure it'll correctly respond to the questions Jenny is going to ask it, but in the process of getting there, you'll teach it all kinds of stuff. The implementation of this is seamless, and resulted in some really funny messages. The puzzles are pretty simple, but still enjoyable.

Also, this game is set in the same universe as Brain Guzzlers from Beyond! While I've now beaten both, I played this game before Brain Guzzlers. I still enjoyed it, so don't let that scare you away -- from what I remember, it doesn't connect to the specific events of Brain Guzzlers, and just involves the some of the same characters.

In a Manor of Speaking is one of the funniest games I've ever played. Every line in this game is some sort of pun, and the writing style is so enthusiastic and excited. For instance, a "piece of your mind" is described as being "very thoughtful", and you can pick eyes off an eyepatch (failing to use them properly results in "Eye don't think that's such a good idea!"). You can walk into a bar (ouch!). You get to literally take a tourist's picture, find the proof in the pudding, and grow birdseed. There's such a manic energy to this game, I love it. It reminded me of Nord and Bert and You are a Chef!

This game may not be an in-depth puzzlefest, or have super deep characters, or an intricate story, but it's just fun. It's a comfort game, and it never fails to cheer me up every time I go to it. That's what makes it worth five stars for me.

Suveh Nux lets you work out what it's all about just by experimentation. Once I got my book, I started off by typing all the spell names. Then I charted down their effects, and what happened if I used them more than once. This just led to more ideas with what I could do, and it feels rewarding to keep trying and learning new spells. There's a small aspect that confused me, and it was (Spoiler - click to show)the ANI effect. I noticed that some of my effects were delayed, but I thought it was a method to make my next spells immediately more powerful; like maybe it would be better than casting it multiple times in a row? Still, the game has a useful hint system, and is loaded with Easter eggs. Try everything you can, and even if you don't, it's still a fun game.

Not the Lord of the Rings is an embarrassingly shallow game. It's full of immature "adult" humor. You'll run into characters such as Dildo Bumbite, Pipdick Brandymuck, and Stam Gangrene. Items you get include old underwear and smoked joints. Nothing in this regard is witty, funny, or even really has to do with the source material. It's just edgy and gross for the sake of it.

The game content doesn't fare any better, either. Walk through a bunch of rooms, pick up items (most of which are red herrings), explore some mazes. Whenever you come across someone, you usually have to give them an item, but there's barely any logic behind it. It's not fun to play, and none of the rooms or segments really stand out.

The parser doesn't respond to ABOUT, HELP, or most other out-of-world commands. The logic is inconsistent: you can't use GREEN to refer to a green key, but you have to use STONE to refer to a stone key, which is even more confusing because you already have an item that's a pile of stones. Even the speed at which it registers text is disappointing, and I had to type slower than normal or else it wouldn't pick up on everything. You also can't backspace and delete text you've already written, or use up and down to scroll through past commands.

Don't play Not the Lord of the Rings. It gave me Stiffy Makane vibes, if anything. There is nothing of value in this game.