Go to the game's main page
Review
You are a crew member of a spaceship that has run into a problem. Everyone is dead. Except you. For some reason, your cryo-pod is the only one that did not suffer a malfunction, leaving it up to you to find out what happened.
My guess is that this is the author’s first effort at a parser game. They also note that this is in a Beta stage of development. Please consider this more as feedback than criticism.
Gameplay
It needs a lot of work. My main critique is its lack of interactivity. Any attempt to examine inventory items results in "You see nothing special about the [inventory item]." In addition, room descriptions are unimplemented.
Bridge Hallway
You're here. Not that it was difficult at all, it's just amazing to you. Time to find out what's going on. You slip into a chair besides a large terminal and type in your access code. You read vast ammounts of data, sifting through it all and finding interesting bits of info. TYPE SOUTH TO CONTINUE.
>x terminal
You can't see any such thing.
>read data
You can't see any such thing.
Another example would be the room description for the Cryosubmission Chamber. It says you can check the codex for more info, but all you get is "You see nothing special about the codex.”
Also, the inventory items (codex, plasma welder, keycard, etc.) have no use. Plus, "take all" often results in picking up things that seem a little odd to pick up. Such as the debris and corpses. I don’t think I need to go further with this.
At its most basic, the game is just (Spoiler - click to show) walking through some hallways to reach the ship's bridge . It can be completed in 11 moves. I think it’s safe to say that it has no puzzles. There is one locked door in the Level 1 Hallway, but I could not find a way of unlocking it or breaking into the room, even with the plasma welder and keycard.
Story
We learn that (Spoiler - click to show) Life Support systems malfunctioned, causing your crewmates' bodies to thaw out. We don't actually get to learn anything else. Then (Spoiler - click to show) an asteroid strikes the ship... and has no effect on the gameplay other than to (Spoiler - click to show) have you exit the bridge and step into space. Then it’s over. Simply ends in space. Sparse, but provides an interesting skeleton for a deeper storyline.
Characters
There are four crew members, not including yourself. All we know about them is their first names. Examining their bodies results in generic responses that could have been opportunities to build a little background.
>x captain's corpse
You see nothing special about the Captain's Corpse.
The closest description for the characters we get is if you try to take their pod.
>take captain's pod
The pod is welded to the ship. Our captain, Captain Grant, is here. What a horrid, yet peaceful way to go...
Just something to consider. And we only know that the protagonist is an engineer.
Conclusion
I was hesitant about making my one-star rating influence the game’s overall rating, but I figured it might give it more visibility (or am I wrong on that?). Hopefully my rating does not scare people away from giving it a try and offering feedback since it is clearly a game under development. That said, this game was produced in 2015- a decade ago at the time of this review- and is most likely abandoned. But hey, there is always a possibility. The whole waking up-in-a-cryotube-following-a-disaster scenario may feel overused for some audiences, but I happily devour it.
The author notes that this is supposed to be part of series. If that's the case, I am looking forward to the rest.
