Finding Light

by Abigail Jazwiec

2021

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Number of Ratings: 13
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1-13 of 13


- Kinetic Mouse Car, August 1, 2022

- WillFlame, February 18, 2022

- Mr. Patient (Saint Paul, Minn.), February 12, 2022

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
Shapeshifting fantasy adventure, January 7, 2022
by Mike Russo (Los Angeles)
Related reviews: IF Comp 2021

(This is a lightly-edited version of a review posted to the IntFict forums during the 2021 IFComp. My son Henry was born right before the Comp, meaning I was fairly sleep-deprived and loopy while I played and reviewed many of the games, so in addition to a highlight and lowlight, the review includes an explanation of how new fatherhood has led me to betray the hard work the author put into their piece)

Puzzley fantasy adventures don’t tend to be my favorite IF subgenre, but they’ve got deep roots and an undeniable cozy appeal. I was surprised it took me about 2/3 of the way into the Comp to get to one on this year – they’re typically thick on the ground, so maybe they’re falling out of favor? Fortunately, Finding Light does a good job flying the flag, with enough of a twist on the hoary standards of the genre to stay fresh and puzzles that go down easy. It’s not going to set the world on fire, but it’s a worthwhile way to scratch this kind of itch.

Let’s start with the twist, since it’s tied up with the premise: you play a familiar spirit, bound to a boy with magical abilities and able to swap between human and fox shapes at will (the human shape kind of threw me for a loop since it gives the whole nonconsensual soul-binding thing a creepier vibe). The game starts with him being kidnapped by raiders, so it’s up to you to sneak into their fortress and set him free. Your different forms have different abilities – as a fox, you can track scents and talk to other animals, whereas as a human you have hands and er, color vision? Really, the fox gets the better end of the stick here – which come in useful as you work through a series of simple obstacles, from a maze with a twist to a couple of fetch quests.

None of these puzzles are anything too tricky, but they’re not trying to be too brain-melting and they don’t overstay their welcome. Similarly, the setting sketched-in, and the boy you’re bound to doesn’t register as much of a character, but they work well enough to justify what you’re doing. There’s a topic system that makes conversation with the various animals you encounter go down easily, too – these are actually a highlight, since while your master is rather a bowl of oatmeal, the raven, rat, and horses you meet have personality.

Implementation-wise, there are a few small niggles. I ran into a bug where trying to go in non-cardinal directions either didn’t produce any output, or gave a response that only made sense in the maze, and there were some missing synonyms or fiddly action phrasing required in a few places. But it's nothing too major, and the puzzles are well-clued and smoothly implemented. I think this is the author’s first game, and it’s an impressive debut both in terms of programming and design – I'm definitely looking forward to seeing what they do next!

Highlight: The raven was my favorite character, and it was fun to take reading material back to her to decode.

Lowlight: The game doesn’t have any ABOUT or CREDITS text as far as I can tell, so I’m not sure whether there were testers – if not, this is impressively smooth, but regardless, always have testers!

How I failed the author: I was reasonably tired when playing this one, so I appreciated the overall gentle difficulty, but I was thrown for a loop by what was supposed to be a hint: the rat says he has exactly three things to trade, so after I got three things from him I thought I was done, without realizing that one of them was a freebie that didn't count as an additional swap, and I had one more left. Fortunately this didn’t hold me up for too long.

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- E.K., November 22, 2021

- Karl Ove Hufthammer (Bergen, Norway), November 15, 2021

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
I enjoyed this game, November 13, 2021

This was a well-written, enjoyable parser game set in a fantasy world. It had a fun game mechanic where you have to switch your character's form depending on the puzzle you are working on. I thought the puzzles were low difficulty, as it seemed clear what was needed in almost every situation. The exception was (Spoiler - click to show)the maze. I used the walkthrough. I still don't know where in the game you find out how to solve it. When I got the most successful ending, I was hoping for a little more story as to what happened afterwards. My favorite part would have been (Spoiler - click to show)finding out that all the rats in the game are related. When I delivered bad news to one of them, I was wishing the story had more moments like that. I would probably have liked a little more description in some places. For example, the villains are known as "The Raiders." For whatever reason, I pictured them as some kind of creatures, like maybe Gamorrean Guards or something. When they finally appear, they still are not described, but since it is possible to infiltrate them, I guess they must be human? However, I appreciated that there was a way to get some backstory, including details on the boy you are trying to save. So, I would say there is a lot to like. I wouldn't mind a follow-up game set in this world.

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- wisprabbit (Sheffield, UK), November 11, 2021

- Jade68, November 1, 2021

- Edo, October 9, 2021

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
Foxy... *Jimi Hendrix distortion solo* ...Familiar, October 8, 2021
by Rovarsson (Belgium)
Related reviews: Fantasy

A band of raiders kidnapped your human! As his familiar, you are bound to rescue him. Find your way into the enemy base to do so.

Finding Light's premise is simple and straightforward, as indeed the game as a whole is. This makes sure that the player can enjoy the forward momentum and the quick succession of discoveries instead of banging her head against a puzzle-wall.

The obstacles are all pretty standard text-adventure fare. Lock&key, color-code, maze, fetch&trade... The twist here that you, as a familiar (a magic human's spirit guide) can CHANGE between animal and human form. This gives an entirely new dimension to exploring the surroundings, searching for clues and solving the puzzles.

To succesfully infiltrate the raiders' fort, you will need help. Quite a few animal NPCs are willing to offer that help, and while interacting with them you might learn something about their personalities. I found this the most satisfying part of the game. Through conversing with the animals, you learn bits and pieces of their backstories. This makes them much, much more than cardboard characters whose only role is to "give player object x if and only if player gives object y to NPC". I'm confident that a full IF-piece could be made about the backstory of each animal NPC (especially the horses.)

In contrast, one raider is a dumb brute. Another is a mute psychopath. (Hmm, the mute psychopath's backstory may have a horror-game buried in it somewhere...)

I liked the clean writing. The rooms were clearly described and easily imagined. Likewise, the map is simple and easily memorized, a bonus for people who don't like drawing maps.

In the IFComp version I played (v1), I found the implementation wanting in some places. To mention one instance: the verb TRADE might come in handy. Another example is given by Mathbrush in his review: many more synonyms for the solution to the first puzzle should be implemented. You really don't want to get players bashing their computers against the wall because they can't guess the syntax of your "easy and obvious" introductory puzzle.

The main mechanism in the game is a joy to explore. Switching between shapes brings new abilities to experience the game-world and interact with it. I'd like to see it expanded even more, perhaps applying the different senses to every concrete object instead of some objects and the rooms.

A very enjoyable classic text-adventure with a clever twist.

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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
A parser game about a magical fox-human, October 5, 2021
by MathBrush
Related reviews: about 1 hour

This is a fantasy parser game where you play as a human/fox creature that can switch between forms at will. You are a guardian to a young human who has been captured and you have to rescue him.

Gameplay is centered on switching between forms to your advantage. This is done very well: your animal form can speak with other animals, has heightened senses and can fit into tight places, while your human form is stronger and can use tools.

The parser could use some work, and the opening scene is where it struggles the most. Going up or down gives a blank message, and trying to apply the bandages is really rough when it comes to guessing synonyms (things like PUT BANDAGES ON ____ don't work).

The cast of characters is described well, although the raiders stick out as weird (they use strong profanity, where the rest of the game is more at a YA level, and they seem fairly dumb). The animal characters are great.

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- Zape, October 4, 2021


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