Killing Machine Loves Slime Prince

Experimental text adventure in the mould of Heavy Metal magazine's hard-edged sci-fi stories. Crashed spaceships, alien planets, biomechanoids and plasma rifles all figure. You play using just single verbs, but many of those verbs are not available until you have the necessary object to activate them. Compass directions are replaced with WALK and JUMP and further commands as you progress. Makes it pretty difficult to map! But the game is small enough that it doesn't matter. Finding new locations often entails returning to previous locations to try out new verbs you've acquired since your last visit, Metroidvania-style. Although small, there is a ton of optional content to discover. I barely scratched the surface, finishing with a meager 'C' rating. HINT commands are included, which you'll most likely need when replaying to find all that content.

This was a fun treat of a game to experience. You are a violent death machine, used as a pawn in an interplanetary war.

And you love slime prince, one of many duplicates of a true prince. The duplicates are made of slime, mere imitations designed as fodder for assassins like yourself.

The game is a limited parser game, and consists of slowly gaining capabilities over a map of around 20 (?) locations. Most capabilities are motion based.

The worldbuilding is both extensive and light; it's clear that a great deal of thought has gone into developing this world, but we mostly get hints and light touches of it, through the window of the slime prince's thoughts.

I did get stuck at one point, but the HINT command is gentle and helpful. I didn't use it at first, and ended up 'lawnmowering' for a long time. I wish I had turned to help sooner!

Overall, the writing is strong, the game is enjoyable. This is something that can be picked up and played relatively quickly, but is long enough to be substantial.