Raygun Diplomacy

This review is of Release 3. The game credits no beta testers, which I generally take to be a bad sign.

I got stuck hard when I hit this bug: (Spoiler - click to show)I gave the computer tape to Roderick. You're supposed to give the tape to Doktor Giftig; if you give it to Roderick, the tape is gone forever and the game is unwinnable.

The game has a huge map, and tries to limit the size of the map by not letting you explore areas of the map until you've solved earlier puzzles. I generally regard that as good puzzle design, but the game doesn't give you enough hinting that the unlockable areas are now unlocked, most of the time. (Spoiler - click to show)You can't go north from Weed-Choked Street until Roderick tells you to find the cargo pod, but there's no clear reason why you can't do that earlier, or why you CAN go north after telling him that. You can't go east from Wide Street until Roderick has the orders and Giftig has the tape, but there's no clear reason why that is; the game has no clear goal at all at that point.

I think this game is still playable if you use the source text itself as a hint system of sorts. When you get stuck, peek at the source and see if you can figure out how to get you unstuck that way.