Ratings and Reviews by Lance Cirone

(Adapted from intfiction.org post)

Lenard Gunda’s Lazy Wizard's Guide was one of the first IFComp entries I played this year; the charming premise made me interesting in what it could be.

One of my favorite styles of IF game is when you have a magic system that just builds on top of itself, starting with simple spells and then moving on to more advanced and interesting ones. It’s not that common, but it’s always a joy to play; compare Junior Arithmancer. Even beyond this mechanic, Lazy Wizard’s Guide amazed my with its varied characters and non-linear goals.

The plot: You’re a senior student at a magic academy, taking your final exam to be a licensed wizard. The problem is that you don’t have a clue on how do to any of it! Armed with only a Beginner’s Magic book, can you explore the school and its surroundings to figure out how to complete all five of your exam goals?

I love the atmosphere of this game. You’ll run into all sorts of fantasy creatures – tree people, ghosts, gnomes, witches, vampires, among others – and it’s fun to go around the school. The characters you can interact with are unique and memorable, and I’d always liked checking back to see if they had anything new to say as I progressed. Room descriptions are kept concise, and everything you’ll need to know is mentioned. The game also uses a special web parser that makes conversations easier (you get to click numbered options) and highlights certain important verbs or notifications, which improved the ease of play and makes it easier to recommend to people who are new to IF.

The spell system is easy to understand: learn a spell, and you know it forever. If you have the ingredients you need, go ahead and cast it (on something if needed). Some of these are as simple as lighting up dark rooms or unlocking doors, while later ones include entering paintings and summoning vampires. You also have to brew some potions to complete your exam. The versatile spell system also leads to some puzzles having multiple solutions, which I liked.

There’s one area I would like to see improved: if you’re stuck, you can call an “exam jinn” to give you hints. However, most of his hints are vague and there’s points where he didn’t even have anything to tell me. I ended up beating the game without any of his help. It’s also a minor nitpick, but at first, I ended up (Spoiler - click to show)drinking the tea that was meant for Mirlena. She kept asking for it, and I was wondering if I made a mistake, since I couldn’t get any more. I ended up going back to an earlier save to give it to her, but nothing new happened; the dialogue seemed the same and there didn’t seem to be any achievements related to it. It was a bit of confusion that stuck out, considering how good the rest of the game is at giving feedback and ensuring I can’t mess up puzzles.

Lazy Wizard’s Guide is a lighthearted and imaginative IFComp entry with strong gameplay and great worldcrafting. I liked it a lot, and I’d definitely recommend it.

One horrific night in the 1950s, teenager Bonnie Noodleman finds her almost-boyfriend attacked by horrific brain-guzzling monsters from beyond! However will she and her friends stop them? Such begins Brain Guzzlers from Beyond!

This isn't a hard game, but it's of a nice length. The puzzles are pretty basic, but some have multiple solutions, and areas you don't need to go to anymore tend to be closed off. The game is a parody of 1950s sci-fi, in a way that reminded me of Max Blaster, featuring comics with absurdly preachy messages and an absolute lack of severe language (such as "Oh my gosh!" and "We’re in such a deep pickle right now!"). These jokes are where the game is at its best, and I particularly loved your conversation with the robotic Wife of Tomorrow. The sci-fi aspect is handled well and plays a good part in the story. The latter half was full of great jokes with all the psuedo-futuristic technology; it felt like I was playing through an episode of Futurama.

There's a cast of characters in this game, all of whom get unique portrait art, which I didn't expect. The conversations are interesting and full of different options, and a lot of characters will stick around and even get a bit of surprising development. My favorite in this regard was Mary Jane, the hysterical prom queen who (Spoiler - click to show)turns out to be a brilliant inventor. Following these characters throughout the games, learning their likes and dislikes and getting their help to solve puzzles, was definitely one of its strengths.

Overall, the game's appealing writing style, approachable puzzles, and fun characters make it an easy recommendation. Definitely play The Mary Jane of Tomorrow after you beat it, too; that one's great.

You are a disgraced high school Rock Paper Scissors champion. It's been a long year, but you are ready to regain your position, with the help of the three RPS Gods.

Rooms are bare, descriptions are blunt, and the setting isn't that interesting. The two core puzzles here are finding your offerings (a rock, a paper, and scissors), and tricking your sacrifices into making RPS signs. That latter puzzle is repeated nine times and makes up the bulk of the gameplay. Talk to someone until they make a sign (such as holding up their hand as a stop motion, or posing for a picture with a V sign), then do the right symbol against it. Then (Spoiler - click to show)they get sucked into a vortex. It was surprising at first, but this is most of the game. The mechanic doesn't get expanded upon and the difficulty stays low throughout, eventually feeling kind of boring.

With all that said, this isn't a bad game, just pretty middle-of-the-road. It'd be worth a try if you want a more low-key game.

The doctor gives you a word, and you have to respond with a rhyme for it. Rack up as many points as you can before time's up to get a better evaluation. It's something you can easily finish in six or seven minutes, and there's not much incentive to return once you've seen the best ending. It's not a bad game, and the idea is implemented well.

Looking back at the game now, it doesn't seem that revolutionary or interesting. It's almost a troll game, if anything. Games like Aisle have done its concept so much better.

Nuns commence incanting as the lightning strikes your temples thus! Electrifying your chambers wholly, scorching out their sovereignty! You were just a boy, you see! You plead of them, have sympathy for you!

Actually, this game's pretty light on plot. The Kaden have locked your mind's essence away in cyberspace, and your companions, the Souden, might be coming to help you. Most of this game is spent talking to a cube, which is frustratingly obtuse because it barely has anything useful to say. It feels pretty esoteric: you know the spider is used for maintenance, but do you know how to talk to it? It's repeatedly spinning around and holding a doll, how do you deal with that? Other puzzles include just typing a command twice in a row to make it work, or trying to overload computers.

You can easily miss out on story events, including the warp to the game's ending, if you happen to be in a different room than the cube. The game also loves giving you puzzles with time limits, so I had to save often for what's ultimately a short game. As far as the ending goes, I thought it was pretty unsatisfying and confusing. Also, there's these pretentious quotes that keep showing up at the top of the screen, but they don't go away very fast and just cover up earlier text. It'd be easy to turn this into something worthwhile, but it's not worth seeing how the brain plays around.

Indigo is a game that's really more frustrating than fun. I love the concept, but it's not communicated well, and the game is full of bugs. I was relieved to be finished with this one.

You're sent into the wide land of Threediopolis. Your new employer, Ed Dunn, has a list of places he wants you to visit so you can complete tasks for him. But, in this realm, it's not about where you're going as much as how you get there.

Threediopolis is a game that seems overwhelming at first. You have 40 tasks and 10 friends to find. Every place is signified by a 3 digit number and a cryptic description. At first, I was wandering around without a clue. (Spoiler - click to show)I decided to figure out how my movements effected the numbers, then honed in on one place that wasn't far from the start. I had to go down, north, and east. Easy. I tried every combination of these... but when I went north, east, and then down and met a guy named Ned, I suddenly realized what this game was. It's a word game!

(Spoiler - click to show)You have 6 directions, using letters, and you have to spell words with them. Like SEEDS takes you to a gardening supply store, DUNES takes you to a desert, and WEENERS is a hot dog restaurant. There's also a bunch of bonuses if you type things like SENSUS (you fill out a census forum), SUDDEN (a loud noise startles you), and SEUSS (you meet a Dr. Seuss creature). If you can't work something out from the text description, you can try to figure it out with the numbers.

I was able to finish all the tasks and find all the friends, but you don't have to. You can return to Ed at any point to turn in your list and get a final score. The postgame gives you a list of 80 bonus tasks, some of which you may complete over the course of the regular game.

Overall, I found Threediopolis to be a fun time. The writing is witty and funny, even wrong expeditions will reward you with something amusing, and it's not that long or difficult once you get the hang of it.

Very Vile Fairy File has you as Kerry Kyle, transported into a strange world consisting of rhyming couplets. The titular Fairy File will repeatedly show up to insult you until you can put a stop to it.

The game revolves around rhymes: you have to turn Soft Sand into a Loft Land, a Coral Cage into a Moral Mage, a Stark Store into a Dark Door or you can Mark More. Seeing how many puns the writing can string together is part of the fun, especially when you run into a dead-end room.

The game encourages guesses, since ones that might not exactly help will still feed your Lurking Lump, allowing you to use a Jerking Jump to bypass puzzles you're stuck on. It's a fun trade-off, but I did find myself devolving into just going down a list of syllables or letters during particularly frustrating areas. You can also use your Leet Learner to get an idea of whether or not you have to subtract or add letters from a term.

There's a good amount of context clues you can work out from examining objects, and only once did it use a word I didn't know. There's also a flat-out hint feature, but most of the time it wasn't that helpful. Either way, there's plenty of anti-frustration features, and multiple areas will always be open at once, so you can just do something else to clear your head until you want to return.

Very Vile Fairy File is strong and funny, and definitely worth a try if it seems interesting to you.

This game has a nice story, but once you've exhausted it, there just isn't that much to do. The wording on (Spoiler - click to show)the final command is awkward, and while the clues are there, (Spoiler - click to show)it just amounts of doing the same thing in every room until you happen to come across it.