Superluminal Vagrant Twin

The main narrative tension driving this game is a quest to free your titular vagrant twin from cryo sleep after they've been abducted by some unsavory types. The task is simple but the road is arduous as you then proceed to earn enough credits to free your twin, exploring a vast and varied intergalactic environment in the process. It's both the elemental story -- rescue your family from malevolent forces -- and the enormous scope of the world in which this story is set that give this game the feel of a sci-fi epic poem.

As is the case for many epic poems, the structure of Superluminal is episodic and the rhythm is that of a melodious and mnemonic repetition. The player character traverses numerous worlds (several dozen in my case and likely more left unexplored!), interacting with a diverse cast of characters coming from a wide range of socioeconomic situations and cultural backgrounds to buy, sell, and trade your way up to the requisite 500k credits. Each world to visit is evocatively described in just a scant few words and, similarly, every character is brought to life with a terse, smartly composed description. Truly, reading the description of each new planet brought me such great joy -- to take one example, at random, "slender megastructures rise gleaming from the silvery continents below, arcing over oceans" -- and I was heartened to re-encounter familiar descriptions as I revisited planets, akin to a Homeric bard repeating "wine-dark sea" for the umpteenth time.

The game itself is also very compelling. There's a bit of a puzzle trying to match the odds and ends that you're able to buy off inhabitants on one planet to the needs and wants of inhabitants on other scattered planets. Each of these matches is something of a hyper-episode in the larger story. The pared down mechanics (certain verbs common to IF games are stripped out, and there were no instances that I ran into of needing to play 'guess the verb' to advance) make the game easy to jump into, even for a newcomer to the genre, while the variety of ways to earn credits keeps the game interesting. The main quest can be completed relatively quickly (Spoiler - click to show)as there's a large but fairly easy job that will earn the player character sufficient credits to free their twin, but this is only a small portion of the joy of this game. As with many epics, the pleasure is not in summarizing the main story line but luxuriating in the encyclopedic details of a fully-realized world. This is a poetically charged reference book -- the highest compliment coming from someone who adores reference works!

Superluminal achieves one of the finest balancing acts between the literary and game elements that make the best interactive fiction so compelling. This is an epic poem that you are play as well as read.

I had more fun playing this game than almost any other IF title I can remember. The game is in some ways stripped to its bare bones: most planets are a single location; most characters have only a single piece of dialogue; you cannot examine anything. All of this makes actually playing the game a lot pleasanter than you'd think. No need to keep on examining, for example - the information you need is all there already. Interactions are limited to talking to people, taking, selling, or buying objects, and one or two other rarely-used actions.

The travel system in this game is rather brilliant. You need only "jump" (or "go") to any planet whose name you know. New locations are learned simply by talking to characters. There are surprisingly many of them, all described tersely yet very evocatively, with considerable imagination.

Achieving the main goal isn't tremendously hard, but scoring all of the achievements takes a lot more exploration and ingenuity. Despite its claim to shallowness, this game is extraordinarily immersive, and I can't recommend it highly enough.

good depth and keeps you entertained and has a bit of grind. definitely worth checking out

This text-based game allows players to explore on their own terms, chasing scraps of flavor text across intergalactic thoroughfares. The writing is consistent, entertaining, and guides the player to objectives without adhering to a linear plot. If you're interested in finding your own place among the stars, ready to become another hopeless nobody floating among the nebulae, give this game a go.

This game was fun in a way that's common with some simple simulation-type games, but it wasn't typical for IF. It involved a lot of simple exploration, where speaking with different characters introduces you to new places you can visit. A lot of the game involves finding methods to earn money and simple resource management (rocket fuel). While it was enjoyable to play casually, it probably won't scratch your typical interactive fiction itch.