Number of Reviews: 2
Write a review Needs more polish but quite fun, May 31, 2024This is an interesting Adventuron game that you can play through multiple times to experience different mini-adventures. The game has a pleasant aesthetic style, characterful tone and fairly trippy vibe as far as the story and puzzles are concerned.
The author is a non-native English speaker and there are quite a lot of language errors; sometimes this feels like sloppiness rather than just due to the language barrier. For instance, the game setting (the city of Torino/Turin, I assume) is variously referred to as ‘Torino/Tortino/Tourin’.
Occasional bugged responses, and also a few irritating non-responses due to the language issue - e.g. ICECREAM is recognised but not ICE CREAM.
There’s no tutorial to speak of as far as I can see - instead, you can type HELP for a list of basic commands. HELP and HINT do generally give you enough clues during each mini-adventure to get you through it, but I would have liked a defined tutorial section as set out in the jam guidelines.
There are a few places that could do with slightly better clueing/clarity. For instance, at one point you have to type YES after being asked ‘Are you free today?’. This is likely to throw a player expecting to have to type verb noun commands or similar - a simple ‘(Type YES to continue)’ would go a long way here.
Generally, items in the location descriptions are unimplemented, and directions are usually LEFT/RIGHT rather than the more standard NSEW etc. This fits with the style of the game, which in some ways is not really a traditional text adventure, but I do prefer to see those traditional elements (such as being able to examine things) included in games where teaching beginners is the aim.
The initial objective is a bit confusing. Am I having a ‘day out’ or not? I’ve suddenly been told I need to go to work. When you do get to the office, things generally become clearer… but never any less weird!
I really like the game design of playing through multiple times to get the final ending. However, I would like to see a bit more polish and clueing (especially in the early stages of the game) to make it more beginner-friendly.
