Backup

As the author's site points out, this game gets a lot of inspiration from Gun Mute. It's very linear, especially in the beginning. I think that the combat is especially reflected in this work. But instead of a gun, the PC wields a plasma sword, akin to a lightsaber, but very well thought out. The combat works on a system of blocking, attacking, and feinting. It works well, too. You get training with your sword and think, "Hey, this is pretty easy." Things soon become more challenging, but not overly difficult. It's only problem, to me, was trying to figure out when to do what.

I found the beginning to be slightly overwhelming. There were a lot of things to examine and lengthy descriptions to read. It took a lot of mental effort to wrap my mind around where and who I was, and what I was supposed to do next. After that, though, I breezed right through the game. And I was sad to see that it was so short a game. The "puzzles" weren't hard at all, and even were a bit too predictable when I came across them, but the puzzles weren't the point of the game.

As the game ended, it seemed like the implementation was getting more sparse. A small gripe that I encountered several times, because I kept dying, was the lack of synonyms. But the new verbs were well hinted at and the proofreading was thoroughly done. The quality of writing was good, too.

Where I thought the major focus of the game, though, was in free will. You come across two significant choices(Spoiler - click to show): which side you're on and whether or not to kill. The consequences of those choices could have been a little more apparent, to me. It seemed like I could have done whatever I wanted and my life barely changed at all.

Overall, it's a fun game. The style of combat worked well and it was great to play as a computer. I'd look forward to playing a longer game along the same lines.