We Stole a Ship to Run a Scam

Adapted from a SpringThing25 Review

Played: 4/2/25
Playtime: 15m

I am on record as observing that the RPG Maker gameplay paradigm is not exactly my cup of tea. Successful games (for me) on this engine are brief, light on repetitive combat, and heavy on attitude - that ineffable quality of distinguishing itself from the sameness that can plague such a strong gameplay and graphical tool kit. So let’s check out WSASTRAS (wizastrous? WIZASTROUS??? I just like it more now).

Is it brief? Oh yeah it is. Hard to believe I’m saying this, but maybe too much so? You get to meet maybe six characters, all but two of which are pretty functional, solve a mini-mystery and make a final choice. The stakes are established both clearly but also incompletely so that choice is as much about the player’s proclivities as it is the objective scenario. This is actually the most interesting thing about the game! It’s a nice dynamic: forced to choose with incomplete information, informed by your own internal biases. Y’know like life.

Does it have combat? Nonexistant. The BEST choice for this engine! (for me)

Does it have attitude? WSASTRAS distinguishes itself from the field, at least a little bit, in two ways. Graphically it is reminiscent of the primitive pixellated standard for RPG Maker, but more line-driven and cruder. It is just different enough to be notable, but not different enough to undermine the gameplay engine. These things are always esthetically personal. For me I liked it well enough, though it did introduce some fiddly artifacts of aligning sprites just so to interact, as well as seeming to cue interactable elements that turned out not to be so. After some onscreen jittering to be sure. Not fatal, just the slightest of frictiony. The other way it distinguished itself was its light, playful vibe. Most NPCs are functional - giving quests, background or choices, but their dialogue is spiced just enough to allow that they might not be info robots. The egg custodian was a particular standout here. All of it added up to a pleasant enough, if undemanding time. Tweaking its toolkit-driven gameplay in the right direction, if only modestly so. Building to an interesting-for-its-ambiguity final choice. Those ‘ifs’ kind of loom large in the summary I suppose, but at least it is consistently on the right side of things!

Horror Icon: Jigsaw
Vibe: Playful
Polish: Textured
Gimme the Wheel! : If this were my project, I might try to double down on the NPC personalities. Give everyone the attention that the custodian got.

Polish scale: Gleaming, Smooth, Textured, Rough, Distressed
Gimme the Wheel: What I would do next, if it were my project.

I probably would have given this game three or four stars. However, I am declining to leave a star rating as I’m not sure how I should really score this game. This isn’t the first RPG maker game I’m reviewing on IFDB, but I’m personally very conflicted as to how much of an IF game this is.

I did one playthrough. Going by the game’s screenshots, there are probably other paths or bits of content I’ve missed. You play as a crook, impersonating a legitimate businessperson, coming to an island to steal some sea eggs. On the way; you visit different parts of the island, sometimes having to figure out what to say or do to get an inconvenient person out of the way. Once you reach the end, the game gives you three choices as to how to proceed. Still, from what I can tell, the game ends about as soon as you’ve made that choice.

The art is simple, but does have that old-school charming feel to it.

It was a fairly entertaining short game, but it feels much more RPG than IF. I’m not sure if that’s something which should affect the final rating, so I’m not leaving one for now.

I genuinely don't like most RPG maker games, as I enjoy reading text more than seeing game cutscenes or walking around mostly non-interactive worlds. Fortunately, this game keeps most of the annoying parts of RPG-Maker to a minimum, with well-controlled text, relatively fast walking speed, and plenty of options.

You play as a scammer coming to an island to steal sea eggs. You can pick what to explore on the island. As you do so, you can change your character's sprite, and you find out more about what is happening on the island.

The game has multiple paths, with at least 3 endings and a few buildings I never had a chance to explore.

The story is short and a bit quick, but I prefer that in RPG maker over something drawn out agonizingly long.