You are Standing at a Crossroads

An old favorite, so I had to give it five stars. I like "trapped in a strange world" stories, and this one delivers. The repetition, uncanny setting, and unexplained mysteries all work great together. Eerie piano music really sets the tone. I'm also a sucker for horror and mysterious non-euclidean spaces, so this idea of a purgatorial setting with a repeating crossroads checks all the right boxes. While it's never laid out explicitly, you get the sense that you've done something horrible and that your experience is a punishment for past sins. The scene with the feather sticks out as a reference to the Egyptian weighing of the soul and an implication that the protagonist is far from innocent.

The scenes themselves are subtle and off-putting in just the right ways. The imagery—empty zoo cages, train stations, clocks stuck before midnight—drives in that sense of stasis and inescapability. The ending is a total gut punch. (Spoiler - click to show)The desire to escape is the carrot that's been luring you along the whole time, and you finally reach the ending only to realize there's no escape, and you're doomed to repeat these events forever.

At the time I first played it, this was the only Twine game I'd played through multiple times. It takes less than 20 minutes to play, with some very mild puzzles. The genre is creepy horror (as opposed to grossout or Lovecraftian).

The writing is well done. Of the four main areas, I felt one was weaker than the others, but on the second playthrough, I found it even creepier than the others.

The reason I enjoy this game is something others may not care about. I enjoy it because it almost feels ritualistic, like a Greek mystery play about life. The format, the pacing, the repetition, is very successful, in a way different than Porpentine's use of the same elements. I see myself revisiting this game every now and then for the fun of it. Others may have different responses.

You are standing at a crossroads. Wherever you go, you will end up at a crossroads.

The writing is memorable: evocative language, unsettling imagery. Visit a location twice, and it opens up. Enter. Participate. Maybe, finally, you'll discover where you are. Some locations recall childhood - a playground; a zoo - but all are deserted. There is a semblance of life, but you never get to see it for yourself.

Quiet piano music, links which set the pace and mutable text illustrate a place which changes only when you're not looking, which constantly keeps the ground uneven under your feet.

In the pattern of my father's long, long legs, Crossroads presents itself as an unsettling, low-interactivity twine. As dynamic fiction, one tends to ask, would this work as static fiction?

Perhaps not. Not without a way to set a reader's expectations, and let the reader discover how they might be broken.