9Lives

This game feels like a first game that hasn't been beta-tested by anyone else than the authors. There's a lot of guess-the-verbs situations ((Spoiler - click to show)one being that >swim doesn't do anything, you instead have to >swim to boat ; as a consequence, that guess-the-verb problem made me unable to get something else than the "good ending" - I had to go out of my way and look at the walkthrough to get the bad ending!); lots of objects in the descriptions aren't implemented; some objects appear in the description even when you have removed them (classic beginner flaw, I'm afraid...); a few bugs ((Spoiler - click to show) In the medieval setting: >give flag to statue : "i'm only interested in money", the pirate says (?!)), a few typos (lone periods at the beginning of lines, missing extra line breaks between descriptions and prompts).

The "game" part of it isn't that great either; it's really short, the story pretty much unfolds by itself, and you just have to perform a few obvious actions from time to time; all those actions are basically a binary choice ("do you do what is good or this other stuff that is clearly bad?"), and it's "be good several times to win". Oh and the last scene seems really incoherent ((Spoiler - click to show)So the Illuminati give you lots of money but also tell you how to screw them over??)

Anyway, this game didn't work for me on a lot of levels: too short, too many bugs, too linear.

This game is a sort of metaphysical ladder.

You have different choices to do the right or wrong thing. Doing the right thing reincarnates you as something 'greater', and the wrong thing makes you lower.

The game is so buggy, though, that it is very hard to go 'down'.

I have to say, I really didn't enjoy this story. The "choices" were simply too obvious--do the right thing morally to progress.

The writing felt clunky, and the games premise felt a bit too on the nose.

The basic mechanical concept was interesting, and I could see that mechanic being useful/interesting elsewhere, but in a simple morality tale of self-sacrifice, it felt a little pushy.

I don't disagree with the premise or the actions you undertake, but they seemed so self-evident to me as to be meaningless.

There is no story but some singular scenes cemented together by diffuse reincarnation.