Amazingly, I got around to updating the Google doc I was working on with this year’s reviews.  I realize there might be stragglers, but this certainly seems to be the bulk of them.  Check it out if you’re bored.

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AgHncBxQ5mj4dGdEZTMzTkZ1a0tDQlp4a21nWDlTRFE&hl=en

This is a review of “Interface” by Ben Vegiard, a z-code game entered in the 2009 Interactive Fiction Competition.

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A pretty straightforward old-school game that might have benefited from more things to do, both in terms of length and more details in just what you can do as a robot.  Your actions are restricted in several places, and you can’t do anything cool in your brand new metal shell.

Fortunately it’s pretty competent and had some alternate solutions to puzzles, which I always like.  Gilby is seemingly modeled well, I thought he would go back to bed after turning off the stereo, but he actually started his morning routine, then chased me around for his keys.  That was neat.

In the basement, I found a ‘property tage.’  No idea what that was supposed to be.  This was the only real weird bit, overall it’s a pleasant enough package for a comp game.

This is a review of “Earl Grey” by Rob Dubbin and Adam Parish, a glulx game entered in the 2009 Interactive Fiction Competition.

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When I was a kid I was convinced I wouldn’t like Nord & Bert Couldn’t Make Head Or Tails, but it was actually kind of neat, it made me think of what I was reading in a new way.  Earl Grey was shooting for the same thing, I think, but as the game progressed I started to get frustrated simply because I thought something ought to work but wasn’t allowed by the game.  This bugged me and got me to look at the walkthrough, which, in this type of game, was more of a fact look-up than a moment of realization.  There wasn’t really a puzzle to figure out, there was a word I hadn’t thought about.  Though, actually, Nord & Bert had the same problem.

The beginning was good, though I don’t see what the tea party or the lengthy description of what you had to do in town had to do with the game at all, and ‘sea ions’ seems like something of a stretch.

Overall, it was a neat idea sometimes implemented well.  Not sure if there’s some systematic way to improve the mechanic (a thesaurus checker?), but there were enough good ideas and cute bits to be worth a good score.

This is a review of “Byzantine Perspective” by Lea, a z-code game entered in the 2009 Interactive Fiction Competition.

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“Byzantine Perspective” is pretty much a one-puzzle game, supplemented by a intentionally deceptive feelie that is actually pretty nice.  It took not an unreasonable amount of time to ‘get’, and was a bit tricky, but my main problem is just that I don’t get how it happened.  It wasn’t surreal or fantastic, it just doesn’t make sense, and the game doesn’t bother to say why or how this might be, it just expects you to deal with it.

I have to admit, one thing that boggled my game a bit was the second part of the puzzle, where you use the button to change the direction your perspective is shifted… On my very first try, I was shifted into the room you need to reach using the button.  So I never, really, actually figured it out.

This is a review of “Rover’s Day Out” by Jack Welch and Ben Collins-Sussman, a glulx game entered in the 2009 Interactive Fiction Competition.

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I got the twist to “Rover’s Day Out” pretty quickly, but that seemed to be expected.  I was really impressed as the game progressed, running commentary was interesting and a kind of reveal I’ve never really seen before.  Others have mentioned that it’s really tedious to do the same mundane tasks over and over; fortunately, there aren’t that many.

I think it might have helped simply to have more things to do in this pseudo-house – which brings up my main complaint, the ending sequence was infuriating.  The game dumped all of these expectations on me but never bothered to tell me exactly what was at stake and what my options were.  It does have some funny responses, but was constantly reminding me that I had to succeed in what I was doing.  Inevitably, bad shit happens, I’m berated for not stopping it, and I’m irritated enough that I feel like I need to restore, rather than seeing it to a conclusion… which seemed to be the intended course of action.

What might have prevented this would simply be to have more potential actions in the house – and show their responses in the status like (which was a great addition).  Beyond, say, brushing my teeth, I don’t know any additional actions that might have helped me, and I think it would have been neat to experiment with them.

The game overdoes the technobabble, I think, in the latter portion, it all started to glaze together and become meaningless.  There were a couple bugs; twisting the plunger without a direction gives a default response (“It is fixed in place”, obviously wrong), “x black” in the bathroom responds, “Which do you mean, the black plate or the black business robe?”  Weird.

I’m probably being too hard on the game for my own quick-to-anger response.  The beginning is smart and tricky (do we really need more BSOD and UNIX jokes, though?) and brings a lot of things together towards the end.  That’s impressive enough for a good score in my book.

This is a review of “Broken Legs” by Sarah Morayati, a glulx game entered in the 2009 Interactive Fiction Competition.

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This was a tightly wound ball of nasty.  I didn’t mind it too much, I don’t as a rule dislike playing unlikable PCs.  And you’re given an interesting goal, it isn’t simply meanness for meanness’s sake.  It is frighteningly difficult, way out of my league.  So while I can appreciate what it is, it’s not really my thing.

Something I sure would have liked was simply some more functionality in each of the rooms – they feel really sparse, especially considering the delicate balance of what you need to do.  The inclusion of numerous “WHAT IS X” and “WHO IS Y” is fantastic, and helped me get into the role, but here as well Lottie’s voice kind of overwhelms the simply necessity of learning something.  She tends to drown out the functionality of the game… maybe that’s intentional.  This led to multiple cases where what I needed to do just wasn’t clued very well.

I did use the walkthrough to beat the game, and I like the ending – one thing that makes or breaks a ‘bad PC’ game is its ending – how do you satisfactorily end a story about someone you don’t like?  It’s done well, here, even adding some meat to subsequent play-throughs.

This is a review of “The Duel in the Snow” by Utkonos, a z-code game entered in the 2009 Interactive Fiction Competition.

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This was a really sneaky little game.  The beginning is almost flat, there’s an odd dream sequence followed by wandering around your very quiet house.  The background comes like a waking dream, and that’s certainly intentional – the PC feels very disconnected from what’s happening to him, perhaps even more so than the player.

So as the player starts piecing together what’s going on, Victor remains blasé and distant.  I know pretty much zilch about Russian literature, but the conventions and sensations the game were really striking.  The game has a definite die-then-you-figure-out-what-to-do vibe, but ultimately, it makes fun of that idea.

The ‘winning’ ending, which I reached pretty much haphazardly after losing and reading that ending, struck most people – including me – as basically… unpalatable.  But I think that was exactly the point.  The realizations that the player reaches – and, I can only assume, Victor reaches as well – are only reached as we fall back asleep and make the connections that only our subconscious can.

The score is either 0 or 1.  The ‘ranks’ are dead and not dead.  Both of these ring false as well.  But the ‘Amusing’ option at the ending prompt includes the phrase

Did you discover…

What really happened?

…is the worst sneaky bit of all.  I felt like this game was pretty much pointing out the weird disconnect between good stories and good games.  The gaming part makes no real sense next to the dying realizations you reach.  Of course Victor cannot take seriously our attempts to interrogate Kropkin, and welcomes his old friend after his miraculous survival.  The ‘good’ ending is a gamer’s Achievement Unlocked ending, and an author’s silly ending.  The ‘bad’ ending is a gamer’s insult, and an author’s conclusion.

I thought it was delightfully mysterious.  Probably my favorite game among the bunch.

Verily, this is a review of “Yon Astounding Castle! of some sort” by Tiberius Thingamus, an Adrift game entered in the 2009 Interactive Fiction Competition.

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I’ll admit it – I cannot get the title of this game out of my head.  I read the first few paragraphs and thought, “Seriously?  Seriously? You’re brave, game.  You’re very brave.”  And somehow I enjoyed the faux-medieval romance voice the whole time I played it.  I know some people hated it instantly, and I guess I can’t blame them.  The whole thing is better if you ham it up in your head, though.  Imagine everything read by a slightly drunk Patrick Stewart.  Or, possibly, a slightly drunk Patrick Stewart dressed like Don Quixote.

The game is basically a one-joke game wrapped around a old-school treasure hunt in a castle.  The joke, like I said, I liked.  The treasure hunt is loooong.  I hit two hours and only seemed to be halfway (if number of treasures is any indication).  Fortunately they were relatively active hours; there are lots of things to do.  It’s just that a one-joke game wrapped around anything can’t be too long.

Something I would have preferred is simply a smaller map – I felt like I was wandering around in random directions; the map overall just looks like a jumble with no attachment to a real place.

This is a review of “Beta Tester”, by Darren Ingram, a z-code game entered in the 2009 Interactive Fiction Competition.

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Last year there seemed to be a lot of ‘test games’, ones where the author played around with his preferred programming language, made some random neat stuff, and released it as a game.  This is what ‘Beta Tester’ felt like, though I think I wouldn’t grade it as harshly as some of the ones from last year.

There’s several puzzles, and a consistent theme, but no real progression.  You do something, then do a few other things, then end the game.  The first puzzle was actually kind of cute, a take-off of overly complex puzzles and it had an entertaining ‘voice’ to it.

The pause thing (wherein “Hit space to continue” is strewn throughout the game) is annoying, but fortunately decreases in frequency as you progress… still, given other people’s comments, even a few appearances may be too many.

Overall, I don’t think it’s memorable, even if a few places are actually kind of funny.  As an actual game, it doesn’t rise to the challenge, as a test-bed, it’s pretty interesting.  I hope the author makes something else next year.  Like, intentionally.

This is a review of “Condemned,” by a delusional (er, wait, delusioned?) teenager, a z-code game entered in the 2009 Interactive Fiction Competition.

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One of my notes from playing “Condemned” says “Not sure what to think of this.  It’s losing track of what makes it interesting.”  And that’s mostly my reaction to it; there are lots of sharp details about your life (and your sister’s), what you’re after as a kid growing up, and what you want to avoid – splitting completely from your home life, such as it is.

I do want to like this game, but it’s just too damn manipulative.  It’s formulaically so, you can tell right off the bat that something TERRRRRIBLE is going to happen to your precocious little sister.  Rather than concentrating on its interesting themes, it would rather hold a bullhorn up to a scripted screaming match.

With that said, it’s still good in a lot of ways.  I liked Jill, I liked what the main character had to deal with, I liked the weird lack of the terrible stepfather – but its manipulative nature descends into the playability of the game (this is a difference with, say, Photopia).  The game basically demands that you proceed with what you don’t want to have happen.  It drew itself into a corner and tried to pull me with it, and that annoyed me.

Please, please, please, if you listen to nothing else, know that no game needs things like “talk to jill (do this 7x)” or “z (11x)” in its walkthrough.  There is something wrong with your game if it does.