Archived from groups: rec.games.int-fiction (More info?)
Zero
As I understand, Santoonie doesn't have the best reputation in the IF
community. I never played a game of them before, but somehow I enjoyed
Zero pretty much. You play a goblin, who has to get things in the
goblin cave back in order after a raid by humans. That essentially
means collecting items and bringing them back where they belong. The
room descriptions are terse and accurat and gameplay is entertaining.
There is a wonderful, swearing sidekick and the whole experience was
very amusing (after I got a hint who to play the whole thing...)
Problem: After two hours I found myself at the City of Murl, Front
Gate. _None_ of the nouns in the room description was implemented and
there seemed to be _nothing_ the player could do. Obviously, the whole
thing was stopped being programmed far from completion. Now that's a
shame!
5/10
A Day in the Life of a Superhero
I was looking forward to this one: I really dig superhero games
(movies, comics etc.) and the beginning of the game is absolutely
hilarious. Sadly, after a short while I found out this is no superhero
game (at least the PC doesn't have any special powers). It has some
_very_ funny moments, but at no time is suspenseful or evoking that
special superhero feeling (as E&S or Crimson Spring do). The story has
no real arc and mostly silly. And then, there are technical problems:
the scoring system doesn't work, no orders can be given to NPC's, some
verbs are missing and there are problems with the conversation system.
In presence of „The Cat" – villain who can kill you after all – the
command „fight cat" produces the answer „There is nothing worth
fighting here." That kills the fun. Whyld's talent for writing is
wasted on a genre he doesn't seem to care about very much.
4/10
Bellclap
You are god. Like the guy from the old testament, who craves the
sacrifice of animal and those kind of things. Now that's a perspective
I was always interested in! Goal of the game is to guide one of your
worshippers in safe haven. That is done by telling him (through your
assistent who is a _great_ NPC) what to do. This change of perspective
works very well, the puzzles are logical (after accepting the premise
of the story), the game is technical ambitious and excellently
written. It just is bit too short and perhaps something to surprise
the player would be nice.
8/10
Stack Overflow
A far as I got (on the space station), it's not clear where the story
is going. But I was clear in my mind, that I had _no_ chance of a
successful traversal, since I didn't even get the hints for the
machine puzzle in the sphere room. Sadly, what I had since so far
didn't captivate me enough to exert my mind any further. There also
were some spelling and grammer errors.
3/10
I must play
Playing a child locked up in an arcade, the goal of the game is to
successfully play all the games and by that getting to the top of the
high score board. That's not too hard and the puzzles are nice, but
the whole thing never got me too excited. It's a piece mostly for
nostalgic gamers that spent the eighties mostly in arcades.
5/10
Kurusu City
The fifteen year old Miki Madea is skipping classes to free Kurusu
City from the ruling robots. Of the contents, it's clearly an anime
piece, but I fails to evoke the special charm of the genre. The
writing is more like Zork and it misses humor. The game heavy on
puzzles, however, I didn't get very far in the two hours I played
before voting. I probably won't finish it anytime soon either.
5/10
The Great Xavio
Haggerston (Professor of Logic) and his side-kick Todd (Ph D Student –
controlled by the player) try to find out the trick of a magician. But
when the corpse of the magician is found, they have to solve a murder
case. Although the game is competently written and has no technical
flaws, I din't enjoy it. The puzzles are not very inventive, but still
(for me) very hard to solve. After playing it with the walkthrough I
still have no idea how I should have thought about some solutions
myself.
5/10
Splashdown
Splashdown was the game I enjoyed most in this years competition and I
would have liked to see it win. The voyage of a space ship of settlers
has come to an abrupt end shortly before landing. The computer wakes
the protagonist from his cyber sleep, for him to solve the problem and
save the settlers. The game is very influenced by the games of
Infocom, especially Planetfall. There is a Floyd-esque robot
side-kick, some references , the plot resembles Planetfall and so on.
But all that is perfectly realized. It is humorous without being
silly, the story may have been seen before, but the reason why the
ship crashed and how the explanation is implemented are great.
Moreover I enjoyed the puzzles very much (I used hints only once and
only to get further in the two hours judging time – and even that
puzzle could clearly have been solved without hints). Great game!
9/10
Zero
As I understand, Santoonie doesn't have the best reputation in the IF
community. I never played a game of them before, but somehow I enjoyed
Zero pretty much. You play a goblin, who has to get things in the
goblin cave back in order after a raid by humans. That essentially
means collecting items and bringing them back where they belong. The
room descriptions are terse and accurat and gameplay is entertaining.
There is a wonderful, swearing sidekick and the whole experience was
very amusing (after I got a hint who to play the whole thing...)
Problem: After two hours I found myself at the City of Murl, Front
Gate. _None_ of the nouns in the room description was implemented and
there seemed to be _nothing_ the player could do. Obviously, the whole
thing was stopped being programmed far from completion. Now that's a
shame!
5/10
A Day in the Life of a Superhero
I was looking forward to this one: I really dig superhero games
(movies, comics etc.) and the beginning of the game is absolutely
hilarious. Sadly, after a short while I found out this is no superhero
game (at least the PC doesn't have any special powers). It has some
_very_ funny moments, but at no time is suspenseful or evoking that
special superhero feeling (as E&S or Crimson Spring do). The story has
no real arc and mostly silly. And then, there are technical problems:
the scoring system doesn't work, no orders can be given to NPC's, some
verbs are missing and there are problems with the conversation system.
In presence of „The Cat" – villain who can kill you after all – the
command „fight cat" produces the answer „There is nothing worth
fighting here." That kills the fun. Whyld's talent for writing is
wasted on a genre he doesn't seem to care about very much.
4/10
Bellclap
You are god. Like the guy from the old testament, who craves the
sacrifice of animal and those kind of things. Now that's a perspective
I was always interested in! Goal of the game is to guide one of your
worshippers in safe haven. That is done by telling him (through your
assistent who is a _great_ NPC) what to do. This change of perspective
works very well, the puzzles are logical (after accepting the premise
of the story), the game is technical ambitious and excellently
written. It just is bit too short and perhaps something to surprise
the player would be nice.
8/10
Stack Overflow
A far as I got (on the space station), it's not clear where the story
is going. But I was clear in my mind, that I had _no_ chance of a
successful traversal, since I didn't even get the hints for the
machine puzzle in the sphere room. Sadly, what I had since so far
didn't captivate me enough to exert my mind any further. There also
were some spelling and grammer errors.
3/10
I must play
Playing a child locked up in an arcade, the goal of the game is to
successfully play all the games and by that getting to the top of the
high score board. That's not too hard and the puzzles are nice, but
the whole thing never got me too excited. It's a piece mostly for
nostalgic gamers that spent the eighties mostly in arcades.
5/10
Kurusu City
The fifteen year old Miki Madea is skipping classes to free Kurusu
City from the ruling robots. Of the contents, it's clearly an anime
piece, but I fails to evoke the special charm of the genre. The
writing is more like Zork and it misses humor. The game heavy on
puzzles, however, I didn't get very far in the two hours I played
before voting. I probably won't finish it anytime soon either.
5/10
The Great Xavio
Haggerston (Professor of Logic) and his side-kick Todd (Ph D Student –
controlled by the player) try to find out the trick of a magician. But
when the corpse of the magician is found, they have to solve a murder
case. Although the game is competently written and has no technical
flaws, I din't enjoy it. The puzzles are not very inventive, but still
(for me) very hard to solve. After playing it with the walkthrough I
still have no idea how I should have thought about some solutions
myself.
5/10
Splashdown
Splashdown was the game I enjoyed most in this years competition and I
would have liked to see it win. The voyage of a space ship of settlers
has come to an abrupt end shortly before landing. The computer wakes
the protagonist from his cyber sleep, for him to solve the problem and
save the settlers. The game is very influenced by the games of
Infocom, especially Planetfall. There is a Floyd-esque robot
side-kick, some references , the plot resembles Planetfall and so on.
But all that is perfectly realized. It is humorous without being
silly, the story may have been seen before, but the reason why the
ship crashed and how the explanation is implemented are great.
Moreover I enjoyed the puzzles very much (I used hints only once and
only to get further in the two hours judging time – and even that
puzzle could clearly have been solved without hints). Great game!
9/10
If I recall, very few reviewers *didn't*
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram