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Review
Note: This review was written during IFComp 2024, and originally posted in the authors' section of the intfiction forum on 25 Sep 2024.
That is a lot of capitalisation!
I run my Mac in dark mode. This is a very white screened game, with black text … more awake than I often like to be!
However that aside, this is an evocative short choice-based piece, where you are a ruler, looking after a fantasy kingdom, in the face of oncoming strife.
Initially it took me a while to adapt to the rather over-written text. So many “throng” references in the opening portions! But it does capture the feel of the piece, and helps you get into the mindset of the ruler you are playing.
Prompted by the idealistic impressions at the start I was already questioning the narrator, even before the first main choices, none of which were ones I wanted to make, or thought might have good outcomes! Not least for the workers.
More ornate words appear. Is “postulates” even the right word in the context used? You definitely get the feeling of a ruler with an inflated sense of importance.
Then things really kick off. I was especially struck by the series of quick fire reports that appear on screen at one point. It reminded me of timed text in interactive fiction, but in an opposite way. The effect here was immediate, impactful and built tension, not slowing it as timed text often does for me. I could still click through in my own time, but the impression was almost of a series of slaps to the face of the ruler, as more and more things went wrong, in quick succession.
And throughout this there are still bad choices on offer. There is very much a sense of helplessness. Sadly the later portion of the game has an increasing number of typos, which I did find distracting. I don’t know if these sections were written late on, and not checked so much. But proofreading - especially by others - can be such a help, even in a choice piece.
Then things come to a climax, in a satisfyingly helpless way.
I liked a lot about this. The writing is strong and emotionally effective. The world building is imaginative. And the story moves relentlessly on. Just a shame about the typos.
Totally trivial and shameless point: though I should probably be thinking of Samuel Taylor Coleridge more, or at least the real life Shangdu, the game’s title couldn’t help reminding me of Olivia Newton-John’s Xanadu film which I watched fairly recently.
