Reviews by ChanceOfFire

A simple choice game, where you head around a ship, picking stuff up. Navigating this ship via choices was pretty tricky at first, but I got the hang of it after a bit. After performing an action, you are still able to perform it again and again, with the exact same text. The game needs some way to acknowledge that you had already done it before.

I managed to find two endings, both of the fantastical and otherworldly sort. I won’t spoil anything, but to give you an idea of what I’m talking around, imagine I’m riding my horse in my shining armor across Middle Earth, and suddenly, a shuttle comes down with Darth Vader, inviting me to his Death Star. That’s sort of one of the endings. It’s outta this world.

I’m scratching my head. Smiling a bit too.

You chance upon a bottle, one which carries an important message about a city which destroyed itself.

A Bottle from the Future is a game with an environmental message. You have plenty of choices, from ignoring warnings given to trying to pursue them, which in fact reflects the decisions we can make in real life with regards to the coming environmental crisis. There is a good amount of branching, and also a quiz, a puzzle which I brute forced, a link to a carbon footprint calculator and so on. Ultimately, it carries some important messages about learning from the past and deciding between action and inaction.

That said, I’m taking off a star due to the game’s presentation style. Some of the text is overlaid against a colorful picture, which looks pretty from a distance but make the text really painful to read. At some parts, boxes are put behind the text to improve readability, but some of the selections for color contrast really hurt my eyes. I appreciate the design work, and I personally understand (from making my own crappy art) how hard it is to balance colors with readability at times. Still, I think even taking away that massive picture and using something more low key for a background would have been better.

There is a fair bit of replayability with different options and branching. The game also does a good job of conveying its message. Still, some parts can be pretty tough on the eyes.

Full Disclosure: I am a credited beta tester for this game.

First Bull Run is on the shorter side in terms of wordcount, but still provides a pretty enjoyable experience with content for multiple playthroughs.

One of the first things I’ll mention is that this game is an absolute masterclass for folks who want to have plenty of pictures in an IF game with limited art skills. The game has plenty of pictures from the public domain, allowing you to pick your own character portrait and also allowing you to see various other commanders on the field. Army maps are also provided in game, which while simple in design and not complicated to make, helped to convey the situation on the battlefield. It has the military vibe too. Plus, you can see your character’s name on those maps too.

The writing is solid, and helps to convey the intensity of battle. There are no traditional choicescript stats here, so you will need to read through the text carefully to decide what could give you the best outcome. I’m still having a bit of difficulty with that Gold Medal, but I’ll get it at some point.

The game doesn’t take too long to finish, although it’s still worth a replay to see how things could have turned out differently.

I’d definitely recommend this if the genre is your thing.

Ever since the first book, I had always felt that Choice of the Consort or Choice of Court Intrigues would have been a better name for this game. There is technically romance here, but it's just not very romantic.

As the son/daughter of an impoverished noble family, it's up to you to find a wealthy suitor to bring your family to a better financial place. Like Choice of Broadsides, you have four major stats, and can pick your strongest and weakest ones.

Still, you have a choice of three suitors, broadly described as another impoverished noble who wants love, a wealthy merchant who wants a spouse, and the ruling monarch who is married but is looking for affections elsewhere.

I didn't like the first character at all, and she reminded me a lot of that forced RO in the original Heroes Rise. She was clearly meant to be the 'true love' character, but I didn't feel that way about her at all.

The second character is actually more interesting, and has some surprising depth to her. On the surface, she is trading her wealth for your influence, but you find that she's affectionate and wants to love you as well, just that she isn't quite good at doing it. Still, if you pick this route, the ending scenes are adamant that you have traded happiness for money and thus suffer for it.

Being in some kind of relationship with the third character is necessary to advance beyond the first book. Otherwise, the story is considered 'finished'. This route does bring in some elements of thrill from doing something illicit, and is an interesting depiction of how one trades away principles and propriety for power (and maybe love?) If you survive to the end of the first book, the next parts of the adventure are about navigating court intrigue and power struggles.

The game is well written in general, but the main problem is that each RO is broken down into a different type of objective and motivation. A true romance game would have had three characters with three different types of personalities which make them stand out in their own way, but here, it's all about the mechanical motives for marriage. The game also is quite forceful about the outcomes of each RO choice, without really letting you explore whether you could have made that relationship different. (It was supposed a practical marriage, but maybe you could have found love in it?)

If you want a game about court intrigue and power struggles rather than romance, this is it.

Meanwhile, I'm thinking there should be other ways to help my impoverished noble family. Maybe by joining the army as an officer, being a merchant, getting a job as an academic or something. I mean, why not? I have the stats for it. But for now, marriage is the only option.

Ok, it's your day off. You have nothing planned, so you're free to do whatever you want. Time to head off in a random direction and get into some trouble. (On another note, I need to start figuring out when to use my own vacation days soon. I'm such a hoarder.)

I would describe My Day Off Work as an open and free exploration game in a text medium. You wake up, and you can decide to waste time at home, or head somewhere, like the mall or the beach, engaging in all manner of mundane and unproductive things, the sort of thing you do when you've too much free time on your hands.

The game keeps your name and gender ambiguous, although I just had a male PC vibe while playing. While it is possible to survive to the end of your day off after doing all sorts of (silly?) things, bad ends are present, some of which include death. Writing is mostly solid. I don't think I saw any typos.

It is fun to just head off somewhere and see what happens to you. This is the sort of game meant to be replayed over and over again to find all the stuff within, and one which turns up surprising nuggets of content wherever you go. If you are looking for a more traditional sort of choicescript game, this isn't it. Still, I found it quite entertaining.

Despite the many pokémon references, this ain't a game for kids. You play as a (female) pikachu, looking to find a date with one of four other ladies... I mean, pokémon. You swipe that app, look for a place to meet up, say hi, and you-know-what happens.

The writing is pretty amusing and entertaining. I liked most of the pokémon references, although a few made me cringe. That said, apart from your choice of potential dates, this game is an entirely choiceless experience once you head out with your other poké half.

It's short even if you do all four routes, but I think it was just right for a short read.

It's short, but well written with lots of charm. You travel abroad to meet your long-distance girlfriend. For the demo, you have one day to spend with her, with various choices like going to the mall, the arcade and so on.

Kichi's art is cute, and the game also has some interesting animations and poses. My guess is that the backgrounds are photographic images with filters applied, but they looked pretty good. The music is a bit... minimal, but it's solid too.

It was short, but I really enjoyed it, and hope to see more from the developer.

(Annoyingly, text rollback didn't seem to work. I don't know if the dev disabled it, or something went wrong on my end.)

This VN is pretty short, and really feels like a demo. You head to school, and interact with some of the ROs. Then, the game tells you your numerical score with each one before ending the game.

The music is charming. The character art is simple, but endearing. The background art looks nice, but some parts of it had me scratching my head. In a classroom scene, a lot of the tables didn't seem to have properly drawn legs, and some of the shadows didn't match up.

The writing is pretty rough. I don't want to fault the game too much for this, but it was harder to read as a result.

All in all, it's a short demo. You could try it and figure out if you want more from the dev.

Elemental Saga has a fairly interesting premise. You head to school, discover your elemental powers and later get drawn into a conflict where you put your powers into play. On a blind playthrough, the type of elemental you become will be pretty much up to chance, as apparently, it's decided by your stats.

Still, while the story is fairly interesting, the writing is rough. You'll see a lot of choiceless next buttons in the game, and even when you get choices, a good number of them are two choice options. The prose can get heavy at times, and combined with the rough writing and lack of choices, this is not the easiest read.

As far as free HGs go, it's ok, I suppose. You can always give it a go and decide if it will provide you with some entertainment.

It was an entertaining read, as two characters battle their way through a DnD world while the game provides some entertaining conversation via a Discord group chat between a group of friends. (Amusing note, it's called Diskord in game, but the game spells it as Discord at one part.)

There are a few choices, but I don't think the game branches significantly (I only played through twice, however.) Over time, the two characters get close to each other through a certain event in the game, before real life takes over.

The writing is fun and entertaining. The art and sound gives off the cute vibes, but I'm a little more mixed about it.