Fallacy of Dawn

Fallacy of Dawn won the XYZZY award for best writing; if you play for five minutes and don't immediately agree, then save yourself some headaches as this game might be the buggiest to ever win an award. If you do enjoy the writing, then you're in for a treat that is Sherwin's fascinating and demented brain space.

One's enjoyment is also enhanced if you're familiar with much of the 80's and 90's video game references sprinkled throughout, but it's not necessary. I literally spent thirty minutes in the arcade and the movie store reading titles of various games just to read Sherwin's descriptions. I then spent time Googling games I hadn't heard of.

Beyond that Sherwin is excellent at developing characters. The character of Delarion Yar is sympathetic and funny. Your best friend's name is Porn yet he's somehow endearing. And your girlfriend Clara is a rare well-written female in the cyberpunk genre. Each NPC is given similar treatment; even the bad guys are given distinct personalities.

I also appreciated the gameplay; you must earn enough money to afford a surgery that will help you regain your abilities as a hacker and there are many different opportunities (both legal and illegal) to do so and they can be done in any order. Moreover, much like Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, most puzzles can be solved by either fighting or wits. The latter solution tends to be more entertaining, but the former is a nice alternative.

An extra fair warning about the game's bugs and technical issues. While I encountered nothing that crashed the Hugo engine or put the game in an unwinnable state, there are so many instances where the game doesn't understand common verbs depending on the game state. There's multiple locations where room exits aren't indicated at all or there are exits described that don't exist. Some actions can be repeated that shouldn't. And there are so many unimplemented objects. This becomes frustrating because Sherwin's writing deserves the "examine everything" approach by the player, yet it's impossible to tell what will come back with "that thing isn't here" responses. I should add that the game's graphics, while a bit grainy and a bit sparse, definitely add to the atmosphere.

The ending is satisfying if a bit abrupt; I felt like I had more to explore in the town of New Haz (and I did; there were at least four puzzles I never solved). But as I couldn't stop grinning throughout my entire play, Fallacy of Dawn still goes down as one of my favorite games.

This was the first game by this author I played through to the end, and I found it surprisingly entertaining. Years ago, I had slotted it into the "don't bother" category over some of the flaws that are glaringly apparent within ten minutes of beginning, and I'm glad I disregarded that initial impression and tried again.

Where the game shines, and where it's entirely focused, and what makes it worth playing despite the implementation flaws, is the narrative and the characters (there are no "he looks exactly as you would expect a clerk to look" descriptions here), and both are engaging enough in a light action movie kind of way to want to see through to the end. Too often I found myself in a situation where I needed to simply "wait" a turn before talking to an NPC again or before something interesting happened on its own. I can't help but think this would have been a better game if it had been written in a different format (say, CYOA or CYOA-hybrid) that allowed these strengths to really shine.

Unfortunately one of the four or five missions in the open world segment gives away much of the ending if you're at all genre savvy and even remotely paying attention (if you want to avoid this, don't hunt down (Spoiler - click to show)Failed Romero).

Even though I knew what was coming, it was still compelling enough to make me want to see how it played out. In some respects it felt as if the author lost interest after the big reveal; I would have liked to have known more about the ramifications of what was going on. But the conclusion was rewarding and the game definitely felt complete.

If you enjoy action science fiction, this is well worth playing, just save often and have a walkthrough handy.