Violet

5 star: (213) 4 star: (122) 3 star: (38) 2 star: (7) 1 star: (2)

Average Rating: Number of Reviews: 36 Write a review

The puzzles were interesting and just hard enough to keep me looking for the solutions. Violet's narration was witty and the little asides and descriptions gave a very strong feel for the characters. A few little turns such as (Spoiler - click to show)the ending, or the many times I *thought* I had the cable taken care of for good left me gaping for a moment, before I jumped right back in. Excellent entertainment.

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Hey look, I've got a super-hot, rich, clever, jet-setting Australian girlfriend! She's so cool I even think in her voice! And she loves to play charming tricks on me, like (Spoiler - click to show)writing me a letter to tell me I'm dumped... but it's just a "joke"! Hahaha! Sure you do, Mr Freese, sure you do. You don't live in your mother's basement, alone, programming videogames in your spare time, not at all! ;)

To be fair, this isn't the only game in this comp that suffers from the "imaginary super-girlfriend" problem: RIVERSIDE did too, but it managed to redeem itself by turning out to be a giant rib on exactly *that* type of game. VIOLET is just *that* type of game. Meaning a constant smug, condescending, "aren't-I-amusing" tone, lamebrained "whimsical" humour (it's zombie day! ZOMG how hilarious), and a ridiculous over-extended Babelfish-style puzzle (trying to block distractions while writing an essay) where you are constantly one step away from the solution. Freese's very solid implementation is let down by the awful writing and characterization. Less whimsy next time round please!

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Violet is entirely responsible for rekindling my interest in interactive fiction recently. The interesting aspects of this game are amply highlighted in the other positive reviews here--that it's a single room game where everything, even metagame response, is conveyed in the voice of the protagonist's girlfriend. In the hands of a less capable author this would have quickly turned into an annoying gimmick, but Freese avoids that fate so thoroughly that I was actually sad when the game was over. Everything, from the nature of the puzzles (battling procrastination) to the never ending stream of increasingly bizarre pet names (lemon squidgie?), fits together perfectly, and almost nothing in the coding of the game was irksome. The single negative review below (at the time of this review) can only be the result of an unfortunate, soul-crushing cynicism.

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The most unique thing about Jeremy Freese's _Violet_ is its wholeness. The author uses an unusual technique of casting the titular NPC as a voice intentionally willed to exist inside the male* protagonist's own head. Not only does his constantly keeping in mind "what would Violet say?" show his feelings for Violet and his current motivation, but the technique allows an in-game character to comment on both action-based gameplay and out-of-world game messages without breaking mimesis. Even the about-the-game portions of the work called up by the CREDITS or ABOUT commands are cast as a letter from an ostensibly real-world Violet to the author's friends, we the player. The pervasive use of this technique lends the work a visceral force usually reserved for true stories.

A secondary effect of the same technique suckers puzzle-adverse players into playing a puzzle-based game to completion. Myself spent over 15 minutes with _Violet_ before realizing it is not, in fact, a conversation-based work. Conversation through NPC commentary is merely a veneer. The initial tasks in the game are so easy they would rightly be called a basic I-F tutorial rather than a puzzle. By the time the player recognizes the true nature of the gameplay, a desire to see how it all ends has taken over. Besides, surely just getting settled enough to begin writing a dissertation couldn't take much longer, could it?

Well as it turns out, our protagonist is unfortunately very good at sabotaging himself, and the lengths to which he must go become increasingly outlandish and embarrassing. It's something of a trick that, even when Violet herself finally comes on stage to laugh a little at us, the author has avoided making the player feel like a buffoon even as he (and we) makes one of the player-character. The player-character isn't properly named, or even solidly gendered, and the work is in second person, all of which invites conflation of the player with the player-character. But it doesn't matter. Perhaps it's because the work itself reinforces the bemused absurdity of it all (such as the scenes outside the window), or perhaps it's because we believe enough in the protagonist's mission by then so that, by hook or by crook, we'll accomplish our goals and worry about our dignity later. However it's done, it's done well.

Narrative techniques for the problems specific to interaction fiction still inhabit a realm of rumor and black magic, passed between individuals who may never meet. Because the novelty of computer games is front-loaded and cooly intellectual, they can be acceptably reviewed unfinished. Because a story reveals its heart near the end, it must light a fire in the player after basic mastery settles in but before repetition does the same. And because so frequently a video game's first on-stage character teaches gameplay throughout, such a character cannot play a significant part in the story precisely because of that world-straddling status -- thus breaking a rule of static fiction about characters introduced early. But Violet, true to her status as a sufficiently awesome girlfriend, does exactly this. Even as her imagined voice ostensibly encourages her boyfriend to complete his task for the warm rewards, she encourages us to complete ours for the same. It is this solution that raises Freese's magic out of the blackness of grues, and into a spectrum a little more colorful.



* Or female, as the player may change, only, the player-character's gender.

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This game is as rock solid a piece of IF as I've seen in quite a while. It is a single room, single extended puzzle, written clearly. All the objects in the room are capable of being examined and most are, to a great degree capable of being manipulated.

The tone of the game may not appeal to all people. The major conceit of the game is that the narrative is told from the point of view of your girlfriend, Violet. All of the actions you take are commented on by her voice in your head. When you look at the room the game doesn't tell you the description so much as Violet relates the description to you in her own unique voice.

The plot and motivation are developed as the game progresses. There is no need for a lot of background feelies to get the player in the mind-set of the game. As the story developed, the solutions to each situation became increasingly bizarre. Also of note is the status bar in the game which clearly relayed what the next obstacle was in the sequence of this extended puzzle.

Overall, I found this a very satisfying piece of IF.

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Violet is deeply implemented, contains challenging-enough-to-be-fun puzzles and a fine hint system, and tells a really charming story. It makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside. This is the sort of greatness to which I aspire as an author.

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