A Change in the Weather

...which makes me reticent to call it "interactive fiction" at all. What I liked: the writing, the exploration, the fox. What I didn't like: the fact that it really is nothing but a puzzle, one whose logic doesn't necessarily conform to the real world. I like thinking about real-world experience to help me solve puzzles. Example: (Spoiler - click to show) the very first bit about getting the shovel. It doesn't make sense to me that you would need to soften the mud to pull it out...we're talking dirt, not stone. Also, the fox. If you break the shaft accidentally from pulling the shovel from the hard mud, then the fox won't play fetch. He will look at the shaft with interest, but not fetch it if you throw it. But when you break it from prying the boulder, suddenly he wants to play. I see how that makes sense in the logic of the game, but it reduces the real-world plausibility of the game, which I dislike. . I agree with the other reviewers when it comes to a lack of any sense of goal. The game starts off just feeling like an exploratory quest, but you are supposed to do something to win and have no idea what that is. This game rewards tedious screwing around.

To be fair, this thing is over 15 years old. I'm sure it was really cool for its time. It taught me, though, that I'm not a puzzle freak.