Yes, Another Game with a Dragon!

Baf's Guide

An entertaining little romp that's sometimes straight fantasy and sometimes more akin to parody of fantasy, as indicated by the name (which adverts to the r*if community's well-aired dislike for games involving dragons). A few of the puzzles are a bit obscure, but most are both challenging and reasonable, and there's substantially more plot than the typical canonical fantasy game offers. Funny and well-written.

-- Duncan Stevens

SPAG

[...] YAGWAD is the funniest game I've played this year. From the rousing prologue (and responses to "score" and "fullscore" therein), to the delightful ascii art animation in the title, to the encyclopedia salesman (insert Monty Python clip), to the friendly teeth, the troll, the answering machine, the monks....well, I could go on all day. Suffice to say, YAGWAD kept me grinning ear to ear from beginning to end. The humor is dead on, comparable to Steve Meretzky's and often better.

-- Suzanne Britton
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SynTax
Puzzles are not too hard and fun to solve. Recommended!

-- Dorothy Millard
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>INVENTORY - Paul O'Brian writes about interactive fiction

The writing in YAGWAD is technically excellent, and I didn't find a single bug in the code, either. Like I said, if Infocom were a British company, they might easily have produced this game. I mean that compliment as strongly as it sounds. Anybody who likes Infocom-style IF ought to give this game a try. Even those of you who shudder at the thought of Yet Another Game With A Dragon. (And you know who you are.)
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Average Rating: Number of Reviews: 2 Write a review

In olden times, shrouded from memory by the mists of time, darkness had fallen over the Land of IF. There was bitter strife amongst the ranks of Text Adventurers. One powerful faction looked down with disdain upon the ancient traditions of Knightly Quests and Magick Incantations. One archetype above all others was the target of their loathing: the once Noble and Fearsome Dragon.

These Renewers of IF landed blow after blow on the olden ways, diverting attention and admiration towards their newfangled, even experimental games. So harsh was the barrage that Dragons and their traditions were left behind, all but cleft in twain.

One determined Author stood steadfast against this brutish barbarity that guised itself as "Modern IF". He set out on a Quest to restore the Dragons' honour and created Yes, Another Game With A Dragon.

To fend off all criticism of being a dated cliché, the game employs the gleaming blade of superb literary quality, as evidenced in this extract:

> "The shelves are well stocked with an assortment of dried herbs and pickled embryos."

Or this shining pearl of evocative conciseness:

> "The oily swamp farts wetly."

Within the confines of a compact map, the different locations are coherent yet richly varied. An open woodland with a well in the clearing, a mighty oak and an abondoned monastery, bordered by fields of grain and green pastures. A deep gorge with an impassable river, blocked by a monstrous guard.

There is a deceptive atmosphere of carefree sunny summer over these lands, for there are dangers and discombobulating obstacles in our hero's way. For most of these puzzling circumstances, he will have to sort out the workings of a convenient Magick Machine.

Our hero, by the way, is of the rather hapless sort. He is drawn away from his habituary daytime occupation as the town drunk by the promise of richess in the form of half the king's land and happiness in the form of the princess' hand in marriage. These prizes will be his, if he can be the one to rescue said princess from the cluthes of..., yes,... The Dragon!

Needless to say, many others want these prizes for themselves. Many True Heroes (tm) that is. During the game, there are many instances of "A Wild Adventurer Appears!" These lend the normally calm and silent woods the amusing and confusing air of busy playful competition.

The final confrontation in the endgame mirrors a heroic dream our protagonist had in the introductory sequence. But can he twist it round?

It is not often that I, your humble reviewer, make explicit comparisons between games, but in this case a certain family resemblance should be pointed out.
YAGWAD feels and plays like a sibling to Augmented Fourth and Wizard Sniffer, and it may well be a distant cousin to Lost Pig. It shares with these games a playful whimsicalness, while being very robustly implemented and competently crafted under the hood. There is a great attention to atmosphere, tone, the feel of the world and the details of the surroundings.

The joy and amusement of the author shine through this entire adventure.

Yes, Another Game With A Dragon shows conclusively that yes, there is still room for Dragons in the Land of IF. (At least, there was 22 years ago when this game was published.)

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This game has a mid-sized map and a good number of items and characters. It is not too hard, but it takes quite a bit of time compared to most IFComp games. You are trying to rescue a princess from a dragon, and you have to explore a forest.

You compete with other adventurers, and you have to use magic embodied by water-balloon like spheres that you toss at things. There are several items that you use over and over again.

The game has some sexual innuendos in it that creep up fairly often at the beginning and at the end.

Overall, a game for fans of Zork-style humor.

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