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Visual Tale made for Spectrum 48K, inspired by the classic Christian Andersen tale "The little match girl" (1845). Free adaptation (with new elements -which do not appear in the tale- and sequencing in puzzles) by Fran Kapilla (Sequentia Soft). Engine by Jari Komppa (Much).
Images re-drawn from the 1914 film (film whose authors and actors are unknown and with most of the footage lost due to the start of the world war).
How could those 1914 filmmakers imagine that 106 years after the filming of that movie, someone was going to use the little material left to illustrate a reflexive game?
This is straightforward but well-executed short game. Even if you aren't familiar with the fairy tale the game is based on, it quickly becomes clear that your goal is to stay alive in the snow.
The rest is simply trial and error as you, the player, attempt to find the good ending before you perish. There are two simple loops; (Spoiler - click to show)exploring and stocking up on matches. There is not really room to implement anything more complicated in a 10 minute game.
The visuals are uniquely appealing, since they draw on two different eras: early film and pixel art. Strangely, the effect makes me think of woodcut illustrations for fairy tales, but I do not think that was the intent.
As the author notes, the images were re-drawn from the source film, but I am not sure to what degree the images were pixelated automatically, and to what extent they were drawn manually.
In any case, the game is an impressive and concise derivative work that is worth a quick playthrough.